The Food and Drug Administration will again ask an advisory panel to consider the risks of the drug, Glaxo's second biggest-selling product before questions about a possible link to heart attacks emerged in 2007.
Two U.S. drug safety reviewers have recommended that GlaxoSmithKline PLC's diabetes drug Avandia be pulled from the market after concluding it is more dangerous to the heart than a rival medicine, according to documents released on Saturday.
The composition of the vaccine, announced at the end of a closed-door four-day meeting of influenza experts that is closely followed by the world's vaccine makers, means governments that have stockpiled doses of H1N1 swine flu vaccine may now use them for part of the seasonal flu vaccine mix.
Women who took GlaxoSmithKline's Paxil while taking tamoxifen at the same time were more likely to die of their breast cancer, the researchers found. The longer the overlap between Paxil and tamoxifen, the more likely the patients were to die, they reported in the British Medical Journal.
In the study, overweight or obese individuals who went on a low-carb diet lost about the same amount of weight as those who cut down on their fat intake and took the weight-loss aid orlistat (sold as Xenical or Alli). However, the low-carb diet produced more favorable effects on blood pressure.
The United States has made no decision on whether to cancel or sell any of its orders for the H1N1 vaccine, unlike some European countries with a vast oversupply of shots, a federal health official said on Thursday.
Mild to severe depression might be better treated with alternatives to antidepressant drugs, which do not help patients much more than an inactive placebo, researchers said Tuesday.
Novartis aims to buy the rest of leading eye care firm Alcon for $39.3 billion to reduce reliance on prescription drugs, but is offering minority shareholders a worse deal than major owner Nestle .
H1N1 swine flu can kill children at a much higher rate than seasonal flu, and the elevated risk for pregnant women extends as long as two weeks after they give birth, researchers reported on Wednesday.
The old-style sales rep may have had his day thanks to shifts in the pharmaceutical market and a cost-cutting drive by drug companies.
GlaxoSmithKline (GSK.L) took a further step to build up its non-prescription consumer health business on Wednesday with a small deal giving it rights to an experimental cold sore treatment from privately owned NanoBio.
A new vaccine against polio, being used for the first time on children in Afghanistan this week, will be critical in the drive to eradicate the crippling virus, the World Health Organisation said on Tuesday.
GlaxoSmithKline has started a second large-scale clinical trial with experimental heart drug darapladib, increasing its investment in the new type of medicine for clogged arteries.
Some 10 million people across the European Union have now been vaccinated against H1N1 swine flu and so far no unexpected serious safety issues have been identified, the region's drugs watchdog said on Thursday.
An experimental vaccine cured nearly half of women with pre-cancerous growths on their genitals, producing major improvement in nearly four out of five, researchers in the Netherlands reported on Wednesday.
Sanofi-Aventis raised its outlook for 2009 thanks to sales of swine flu vaccine and posted earnings per share growth that beat forecasts as competition from generics was offset by revenue growth for other drugs.
