-The Times of India MUMBAI: It's widely known that a month's dose of cancer drugs can cost lakhs, but what isn't common knowledge is that Tata Memorial Hospital's doctors are working on alternatives that could cost less than Rs 1,000 a month. Dubbed the metronomic treatment protocol, it comprises daily consumption of a combination of low-dose medicines that are cheap because they have been around for decades. "There is no need to...

-The Times of India JAIPUR: A doctor conducted drug trial on heart patients but seven of them died during trial of the drug. Moreover, another doctor conducted drug trials of different companies and 10 of his cancer patients died during the trials. An RTI filed by a government-run Indore hospital Dr Anand Rai exposed deaths leading to drug trials in entire country. Answering to the RTI, office ofdrug controller general, ministry of...

-The Hindu Business Line   Arsenic and fluoride contaminated water has condemned millions to live wasted lives in West Bengal, Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka. Business Line visited several villages in the affected regions for this special report by A. Srinivas. Sixty-nine-year-old Renubala Ari of Deganga village in West Bengal's North 24 Parganas district is counting her last days. But it is not her death that worries her. Blind in both eyes and with painful...

-The Hindu Business Line From maker of versions of drugs, India's pharmaceutical industry has turned a top innovator Twenty years ago, Ranbaxy was a home-spun drug-maker. The Indian Patents Act allowed companies to make chemically-similar versions of innovative drugs. Visionaries in the pharmaceutical sector, like Parvinder Singh (Ranbaxy's key architect and member of its promoter family) and Anji Reddy (founder of Dr Reddy's Laboratories), were alive. And the pharmaceutical industry did not have...

-The Times of India JAIPUR: In a major relief for blood cancer patients, the state's health department is all set to provide Imatinib tablets ("magic bullet" tablets) free of cost to them. The government's decision follows the April 1 Supreme Court decision to dismiss Swiss drug maker Novartis AG's attempt to win patent protection for its cancer drug Glivec (Imatinib). Currently the tablet is sold in the market by Novartis at...