Archive

BY ALAN OSBORN
THE EUROPEAN Commission today (Wednesday) announced new plans for the distribution and sale of cars in the EU that will loosen the ties between manufacturers and dealers allowing greater competition and lower prices for consumers.

The new rules, which cannot be blocked by member governments or the European Parliament because the Commission has sole responsibility for competition policy, will come into force in October after a consultation process with the industry.…

BY RICHARD HURST
THE INVSTMENT arm of South Africa’s Chemical, Energy, Paper, Printing, Wood and Allied Worker’s Union has announced that it is to acquire a 7.24 per cent stake in Aspen Pharmacare, the country’s largest pharmaceutical group, for Rand 150 million.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE GLOBAL Partnership to Eliminate Riverblindness has announced that US$39 million has been pledged by its members to wipe out Onchocerciasis, (Riverblindness), in the whole of Africa by 2010. The group includes the World Bank, the World Health Organisation, the Food and Agriculture Organisation, the US Agency for International Development and 30 African countries, along with private pharmaceutical companies, (including Merck).…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Commission has proposed a new directive on the authorisation of traditional herbal medicines, providing a simplified registration procedure for products in use for at least 30 years. Although the quality thresholds match those for standard medicines, the usual compulsory tests on safety and efficacy can be replaced by an assessment of information about their use in the past three decades, even if some data was gathered outside the European Union.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Medicines Evaluation Agency has publicised a warning made by German pharmaceuticals company Boehringer Ingelheim International GmbH that users of its product Metalyse have been incorrectly using the vial and pre-filled syringe used to administer the medicine.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
DOCTORS treating Chron’s disease and rheumatoid arthritis with the drug Remicade must ensure that their patients have tuberculosis, (including latent TB), or other severe infections including sepsis, abscesses or “opportunistic infections,” the European Agency for the Evaluation of Medicinal Products, (EMEA), has said.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE UNITED Nation’s Global Fund to fight HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria in developing countries has financial commitments from the private and public sector of US$1.5 billion, the World Health Organisation has claimed. The first meeting of the fund’s board was to have taken place on January 28.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Medicines Evaluation Agency has released comprehensive guidance on the treatment and prevention of potentially devastating diseases which could be released by a major bio-terrorist attack; anthrax, the plague, tularemia, small pox, viral haemmorhagic fever and botulism.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Commission may threaten legal action against national governments in the European Union, after 12 out of 16 Member States failed to meet the January 16 deadline for implementing the EU e-commerce directive. A statement from Brussels has revealed that only Luxembourg, Austria and Germany approved laws based on the directive by that date.…

BY ALAN OSBORN
THE EUROPEAN Commission has formally called on Belgium to bring into its national law a decree ensuring that authors and other copyright holders are paid when their works are provided for lending to the public. Since 1994, Belgium has failed to make any payments, nor has it proposed any alternative compensation, and “damage has been suffered by right-holders of every nationality,” in breach of EU law, the Commission claimed.…