Pfizer involved in deception over new arthritis painkiller drug Celebrex

"A research director for Pfizer was positively buoyant after reading that an important medical conference had just featured a study claiming that the new arthritis drug Celebrex was safer on the stomach than more established drugs. “They swallowed our story, hook, line and sinker,” he wrote in an e-mail to a colleague. The truth was that Celebrex was no better at protecting the stomach from serious complications than other drugs. It appeared that way only because Pfizer and its partner, Pharmacia, presented the results from the first six months of a yearlong study rather than the whole thing."
Read article in the New York Times (USA)

Really I don't think arthritis painkilling drugs are worth the candle. They've done a great deal of harm over the years. See my posts about Vioxx, for example.

You can reduce the pain of osteoarthritis by the simple expedient of seriously cutting down on salt and salty food. This dietary measure also lowers high blood pressure, reduces your risk of heart attack, stroke, depression, fractures, some cancers and many other degenerative illnesses, as well as reducing excess weight caused by fluid retention and helping with breathing problems. - What's not to like? - Try it! - You will feel so much better!

Big Pharma - promoting diseases as multi-billion dollar markets for patented drugs?

Here is an extract from the Dr Rath Foundation (The Dr. Rath Health Foundation) newsletter which I received today:

February 26, 2008

Court Considers Protecting Drug Makers From Lawsuits
WASHINGTON — Less than a week after issuing a sweeping ruling that bars most lawsuits against medical device makers, the Supreme Court heard arguments Monday in the first of two cases that could determine whether drug makers receive similar protection.
Read article in the New York Times (USA)
Comment: Needless to say, the ruling that is being sought here is a last desperate attempt to avert the imminent collapse of the pharmaceutical investment business with patented drugs. Whatever the Supreme Court eventually rules in these cases, the truth about the pharmaceutical industry – including its toxic chemotherapy and antiretroviral drugs - will remain unchanged: While pretending to deliver health to the world, its entire existence is based on promoting diseases as multi-billion dollar markets for patented drugs.

February 25, 2008

Wyeth, Pfizer Ordered to Pay $2.75 Million Over Drugs
Hormone-replacement drugs made by Wyeth and a Pfizer Inc. unit caused an Arkansas woman's breast cancer and she deserves at least $2.75 million in damages, jurors ruled in the companies' first loss in federal court. Jurors in Little Rock, Arkansas, deliberated 12 hours over two days before finding the combination of Wyeth's Premarin and Pharmacia & Upjohn's Provera menopause drugs helped cause Donna Scroggin's cancer. The former factory worker had a double mastectomy after taking hormone-replacement drugs for about 10 years.
Read article at bloomberg.com