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In reply to the discussion: "Woo Wars" - What is "Woo"? [View all]uberblonde
(1,215 posts)61. If only "woo warriors" paid as much attention to conventional medicine...
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/glaxo-chief-our-drugs-do-not-work-on-most-patients-575942.html
A senior executive with Britain's biggest drugs company has admitted that most prescription medicines do not work on most people who take them.
Allen Roses, worldwide vice-president of genetics at GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), said fewer than half of the patients prescribed some of the most expensive drugs actually derived any benefit from them.
It is an open secret within the drugs industry that most of its products are ineffective in most patients but this is the first time that such a senior drugs boss has gone public. His comments come days after it emerged that the NHS drugs bill has soared by nearly 50 per cent in three years, rising by £2.3bn a year to an annual cost to the taxpayer of £7.2bn. GSK announced last week that it had 20 or more new drugs under development that could each earn the company up to $1bn (£600m) a year.
Dr Roses, an academic geneticist from Duke University in North Carolina, spoke at a recent scientific meeting in London where he cited figures on how well different classes of drugs work in real patients.
Drugs for Alzheimer's disease work in fewer than one in three patients, whereas those for cancer are only effective in a quarter of patients. Drugs for migraines, for osteoporosis, and arthritis work in about half the patients, Dr Roses said. Most drugs work in fewer than one in two patients mainly because the recipients carry genes that interfere in some way with the medicine, he said.
"The vast majority of drugs - more than 90 per cent - only work in 30 or 50 per cent of the people," Dr Roses said. "I wouldn't say that most drugs don't work. I would say that most drugs work in 30 to 50 per cent of people. Drugs out there on the market work, but they don't work in everybody."
Some industry analysts said Dr Roses's comments were reminiscent of the 1991 gaffe by Gerald Ratner, the jewellery boss, who famously said that his high street shops are successful because they sold "total crap". But others believe Dr Roses deserves credit for being honest about a little-publicised fact known to the drugs industry for many years.
"Roses is a smart guy and what he is saying will surprise the public but not his colleagues," said one industry scientist. "He is a pioneer of a new culture within the drugs business based on using genes to test for who can benefit from a particular drug."
Dr Roses has a formidable reputation in the field of "pharmacogenomics" - the application of human genetics to drug development - and his comments can be seen as an attempt to make the industry realise that its future rests on being able to target drugs to a smaller number of patients with specific genes.
The idea is to identify "responders" - people who benefit from the drug - with a simple and cheap genetic test that can be used to eliminate those non-responders who might benefit from another drug.
This goes against a marketing culture within the industry that has relied on selling as many drugs as possible to the widest number of patients - a culture that has made GSK one of the most profitable pharmaceuticals companies, but which has also meant that most of its drugs are at best useless, and even possibly dangerous, for many patients.
Dr Roses said doctors treating patients routinely applied the trial-and-error approach which says that if one drug does not work there is always another one. "I think everybody has it in their experience that multiple drugs have been used for their headache or multiple drugs have been used for their backache or whatever.
"It's in their experience, but they don't quite understand why. The reason why is because they have different susceptibilities to the effect of that drug and that's genetic," he said.
"Neither those who pay for medical care nor patients want drugs to be prescribed that do not benefit the recipient. Pharmacogenetics has the promise of removing much of the uncertainty."
Response rates
Therapeutic area: drug efficacy rate in per cent
Alzheimer's: 30
Analgesics (Cox-2): 80
Asthma: 60
Cardiac Arrythmias: 60
Depression (SSRI): 62
Diabetes: 57
Hepatits C (HCV): 47
Incontinence: 40
Migraine (acute): 52
Migraine (prophylaxis)50
Oncology: 25
Rheumatoid arthritis50
Schizophrenia: 60
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"When code doesn't behave as expected, the first question is WHY?" Complete non-sense
Ohio Joe
Jan 2014
#35
Is it okay that there is so much harmful stuff in ''medicine", enough to cause death in some cases
sabrina 1
Jan 2014
#133
There seems to be a small group here in DU that think that they are our saviors from woo and CT.
rhett o rick
Jan 2014
#136
in most cases...no. things like natural medicine have been proven either scientifically effective
Pretzel_Warrior
Jan 2014
#150
OK, if you trash woo threads instead of trying to decide for the rest of us what to read. nm
rhett o rick
Jan 2014
#34
Or, some GD Hosts could recognize that "no conspiracy theories" includes medical woo...
SidDithers
Jan 2014
#37
You seem to think that your definitions and interpretations can not be questioned .
rhett o rick
Jan 2014
#137
Obviously. Why would you respect those that dont agree with. That would be too liberal. nm
rhett o rick
Jan 2014
#156
You seem to think that your definitions and interpretations can not be questioned
rhett o rick
Jan 2014
#159
No. I save my disdain for Hosts who completely abdicate their responsibility...
SidDithers
Jan 2014
#160
I admit that I would rather error on the side of openness and not on the side of censorship.
rhett o rick
Jan 2014
#168
and how many people die, or suffer permanent, debilitating side effects, from scientifically created
niyad
Jan 2014
#93
When that happens, its malpractice, but its standard with "alternative" medicine...
Humanist_Activist
Jan 2014
#21
"Science always looks like magic to the ignorant."... And yet it is still science
Ohio Joe
Jan 2014
#17
Please provide an example of a treatment that many claim to be effective, but that scientists...
eqfan592
Jan 2014
#18
even understanding how a rainbow is created does not take away from its beaut, and the joy of seeing
AlbertCat
Jan 2014
#81
In the English language, 'woo' is a verb meaning 'to seek the affection of another with romantic
Bluenorthwest
Jan 2014
#5
And somehow you think that is done unintentionally. THAT is the funniest part I think. ;) nt
eqfan592
Jan 2014
#22
"...real medicine is based on and got its start, with what is now called Woo." No it didn't...
Humanist_Activist
Jan 2014
#85
I guess it was too much to ask that you might actually read the article.
Starry Messenger
Jan 2014
#131
I did, but you would have to read my post to get the answers to the questions you ask.
RC
Jan 2014
#155
Actually, the studies specifically state that this is NOT applicable to people with deficiencies.
progressoid
Jan 2014
#42
Wow. I've got to tell you, this sort of statement makes me doubt your other claims.
Marr
Jan 2014
#67
remember that half the people on the planet are women who have been advised to supplement with folic
AlbertCat
Jan 2014
#82
'Woo' is a term used by the man who literally wrote the book on Big Pharma
muriel_volestrangler
Jan 2014
#43
The Miracle of Modern Medicine gave me 6 months to live, tops, over 8 years ago.
Shandris
Jan 2014
#49
I'm all about the scientific method, and have practically no faith in any alternative treatments,
Sheldon Cooper
Jan 2014
#54
dead-end materialist "explanations" while trashing and deriding the natural realms
AlbertCat
Jan 2014
#94
Wow that's a grand conspiracy you concocted there, and vitamin C can cure cancer?
Humanist_Activist
Jan 2014
#91
Well stated. Been thinking along the same lines lately. The word 'woo' seems to have become a tool
gtar100
Jan 2014
#80
I trust the rigorous scientific process and peer review than I do the opinion of herbalists.
Vashta Nerada
Jan 2014
#83
The problem with saying "whatever works" is defining what it means for something to "work".
Silent3
Jan 2014
#95
Well said. Research and education are always evolving, there is far more to the universe
mother earth
Jan 2014
#104
Science does indeed adapt to new knowledge, and absolutely science is ultimately self-correcting,
mother earth
Jan 2014
#180