BrandweekNRX

JAMA Survey makes Gardasil Debate Even More Confusing

The WSJ reports today that more than 1 in 4 US women have HPV. On its face, this would appear to bolster arguments (like mine) that Merck's Gardasil HPV vaccine is a good thing. But the survey also shows that the strains of HPV that cause cancer are prevalent in only about 2% of women. Some folks, such as Ed Silverman at Pharmalot, have suggested that this "puts Merck on the defensive" and that Merck shouldn't be "pushing too hard" on the issue. I disagree, as regular readers knew I would. OK, so the number of people exposed to the potentially fatal version of HPV is small. Does this mean that we just give in to the moral squeamishness of anti-science folks? No it does not. We have an opportunity to end one of the most common STDs. Why would we want to walk away from that? And the strains present in that 2% that cause cancer actually cause 70% of cervical cancers. So we also have an opportunity to end one of the cancers that kill women. Again, why would we want to walk away from that? Because "not enough" women have this strain of HPV? I'll say it again: This is a debate between those who believe science can cure disease and those who believe religion (or "abstinence," which is the current buzzword to describe religious solutions to STDs) can cure disease. It is important that the science wins out. (And yes, that's a pic of what cervical cancer looks like, for those of you who don't want the vaccine to be implemented.)

GSK's New Allergy Spray No Threat to SP's Claritin

Unless this spray does something super-amazing that's not yet been reported, I predict that GSK's Allermist allergy brand (which regulators apparently want to see renamed  for the US) will not be too much of a threat to the dominance of Schering-Plough's Claritin brands. Why? Anyone with hay fever will tell you: sticking something up your nose, no matter how effective, is just plain weird. It leaves your nose dripping and then you're afraid to blow it in case you blow out the drug that you just snorted in there. Plus you can feel it dripping down the back of your throat. Bottom line: as long as there are effective, side-effect-free pills like Claritin and its generics, hay fever sufferers won' be switching to nasal sprays anytime soon.

Peter Rost Promises to Shut Up!

Not quite, but that's pretty much the gist of his most current post (here). Basically, he's got a movie deal or two in the works and his book is in its second foreign language, so he's going to stop blogging in order "to focus on the creative process." Longtime Brandweek readers will remember Rost was a former vp of marketing at Pfizer and Pharmacia who complained -- loudly -- that the latter company had cooked up a criminal scheme to sell human growth hormone off-label to healthy people even though it (might) give you cancer; and that the former company had acquired the latter despite knowing what the latter was up to. Rost says the only thing preventing Hollywood from signing on the bottom line is a dramatic ending. "Me winning big, or losing out at a dramatic trial and then living under a bridge, is another good end they'd go for." My prediction: Knowing Rost, this relative silence will not last very long.

Lilly's New Memoir Pen--More Trouble for Pfizer's Billion Dollar Bong

Lilly is in the process of rolling out its Humalog Memoir pen, a diabetes injectable. It's getting good early press. I didn't mention it in my story, but it's got to be one more headache for the pfolks at Pfizer and their Billion Dollar Bong. The guy in charge of it is Matt Beebe. Recognize the name? He used to head up Lilly's Cialis business.

The Curse of BrandweekNRX Strikes J&J!

... So I write about J&J's Remicade movie launch, saying it has "all the ingredients of good drug marketing," and then a few days later, pow! The feds send subpoenas as part of a pricing probe!

The Curse of BrandweekNRX Hits Merck!

Why is it that whenever I write a post lauding a company or a campaign, that the campaign immediately screws up? When I first wrote about Merck and Gardasil, I said the new brand “has everything going for it.” Now we learn that Merck has essentially been bribing the governor of Texas to make this vaccine mandatory. Subtle, Merckatrons, subtle!

Pfizer's Exubera Mess No Longer a Secret

Today I published a story about Pfizer's launch of Exubera. More importantly, you should check out what Pfizer's own people are saying at Cafe Pharma. I quote some of them in the story (“I’ve only been able to sell one Exubera script that I know”) but more, shall we say, robust comments can be found in the original. Why this matters: Analysts check out the Cafe Pharma bulletin boards to find out if products are causing any problems for the field force. It's a matter of time before companies make posting on Cafe Pharma a fireable offense. Use your personal machines, people, not the company laptop!

Readers Who Disagree ... Commentary Roundup

The Merck-Gardasil business has sparked some debate. You can read it here.  A sampling:

• "The specter of being tagged as a 'powerful, behind-the-scenes lobbyist' ... weighed more heavily in Merck's decision to drop this lobbying effort than any fear of the religious right or the anti-vaccine crowd," says Bruce Grant.

• "How can you label those who prefer to take a cautious approach to this as 'pro-cancer' and 'anti-science'?" says Steve Woodruff.

• "I disagree with Edwards," says Fard Johnmar.

Contact Me

BrandweekNRX is written by Jim Edwards, a senior editor at Brandweek. Contact me at jedwards@brandweek.com.

Pro-Cancer Crowd Forces Merck to Cave on Gardasil

As soon as it began winning accolades for its campaign for Gardasil (the HPV vaccine for teenage girls), Merck says, 'Never Mind!' The company has abandoned its lobbying effort to persuade states to make HPV vaccines mandatory in schools, it says here. HPV causes cervical cancer, which can be fatal. This is a significant victory for the anti-science/pro-cancer crowd. “They believe the timing for the school requirements is not right,” says Dr. Richard M. Haupt, Merck's executive director for medical affairs. When would be the right time, exactly? Currently, Texas is the only state mandating the shots. Any scientist will appreciate what this means: The Lone Star state has become an isolated test group for the effectiveness of the vaccine. The rest of the U.S. is the control group. In 20,30 and 40 years time we'll see if the women of Texas have less HPV and fewer cancers. In the meantime, feel free to ask the "pro-family" people why it is that they want their daughters to get STDs and die of cancer. Because I just don't understand it. And if my failure to understand this makes me "biased," as John Mack says, so be it. One final note: My colleague/competitor over at Pharmalot is also wrong on this issue. This is an important argument that Merck needs to win: Vaccines need to be mandatory, otherwise public health--meaning your health--is compromised. We're living in a world where people increasingly "don't believe in" science, leading to such widely  disseminated and dangerous nonsense which you can see listed and rebuffed here. *Merck: Please don't embarass me by hiding any adverse event info on this drug, mm-kay?