Tag: Bayer Healthcare Pharmaceuticals

Crony Capitalism at the FDA – Comes Back To Bite

~ Pharmer

Medical News: FDA Yaz Panel Had Ties to Industry – in Washington-Watch, FDA General from MedPage Today.

Some of the panalists on the FDA advisory committee which endorsed the Yaz and Yazmin branded birth control pills, had ties to Bayer, the manufacturer of those pills.

The panelists of the Reproductive Drugs Advisory Committee and the Drug Safety and Risk Management Advisory committee  jointly voted 15 to 11  that the benefits of drosperinone-containing BCPs outweighed the risks.

Some  members reported their financial  ties to Bayer,  and the FDA thought that was just fine, and not a conflict of interest sufficient for their exclusion from the advisory groups.

Sidney Wolfe, MD, of Public Citizen comsumer advocacy group had opposed that class of birth control pills due to risk of thromboembolism.   His role on the advisory committee was reduced to non-voting status due to his ‘intellectual conflicts’.

Intellectual conflict = bad.  Financial conflict = good.

What goes around, comes around, and Bayer has to feed the lawyers now, after years of untoward post-marketing experience.

Was this an purposefully  constructed food chain?

 

More Kids Having Sex. Sellers of Birth Control Complain that Unbiased Info Unavailable to Teens

~ Pharmer

More youngsters having unsafe sex: global study – Yahoo! News.

The World Contraception Day task force together with Bayer Healthcare Pharmaceuticals have conducted a survey showing that more kids are having sex without birth control and condoms in France, the U.S. and the U.K.

They fault a barrier to unbiased information about contraception as the cause.

Why is this ridiculous?  Just a sampling:

The source of the survey comes from those who sell birth control.

The products are misbranded as contraceptives, which the public defines as preventing fertilization.  Unfortunately drugs classed as contraceptives have multiple mechanisms, some of which are frankly abortive.

These groups  who promote sex among teens are complaining that kids don’t feel EMPOWERED enough to ask for contraception or negotiate such use with their partners.  Yes, young girls often don’t feel that they have the upper hand when coping with  older man who want sex.

It is proposed that the government will confer such empowerment upon the kids.   (Don’t hold your breath for an end to sex slavery, and other socially maladaptive behavior.)

An example of ‘ harmful myths’ is given:  people in ” Thailand and India believe that having sex during menstruation is an effective form of contraception”. FACT: this is an element of the calendar method, which would be more effective than the abysmal morning after pills, if actually used.  Unfortunately both methods are  more than useless for preventing  STDs.

Don’t expect unbiased  contraceptive advise from the makers of Yaz  (black box warning for DVT and stroke) and Mirena (drug eluting, indwelling, coat hanger).