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Claim: Novartis Paid $2.5 Million Ransom to Colombia Rebels

Novartis paid $2.5 million to Colombia rebels who had kidnapped two Novartis employees, according to a documentary on French TV.

The issue is a controversial one in Switzerland, where Novartis is based, because the Colombian government had accused a Swiss negotiator of paying the ransom, and then banned the Swiss from participating in negotiations with armed rebels. The new documentary says the negotiator, Jean-Pierre Gontard, merely opened up channels with the FARC rebels and that it was Novartis that paid the money.

Novartis paid a total of $2.5 million in 2001 to the same rebel group that kidnapped Ingrid Betancourt, a French-Colombian politician, in 2002.

Initially it was believed that the FARC group had received $500,000 from Gontard, but the new doc states the money was five time greater than that.

Novartis declined to comment “legal reasons.” The hostages were eventually released.

referensi: bnet.com

Boehringer Reps Get Legal Victory on Back Pay; Amgen, Serono Reps Could Be Affected

Sales reps at Boehringer-Ingelheim have won a legal victory that may lead to them being awarded back-pay for all the unpaid overtime they have worked. The ruling, by a federal court in Connecticut, could also affect two related cases involving sales reps at Amgen and Serono.

The suit was filed in 2006 by Luann Ruggeri, who was a Florida sales rep for Boehringer-Ingelheim until 2005. She alleged:

…managers, with the consent of corporate management, systematically violated the law …:
a. Failing to pay employees overtime compensation for hours worked in excess of forty hours per week; and
b. Failing to maintain accurate records of employees’ time.
…corporate management deliberately trained, surpvised, instructed and authorized managerial employees to engage in the above unlawful practices… to enhance corporate profits and reduce their labor costs.

The company inaccurately classified sales reps as exempt from overtime pay. That was wrong, the court ruled. Now Ruggeri’s lawyers will be pressing for time-and-a-half for all the overtime worked by Ruggeri.

The ruling will be closely watched by lawyers on both sides of two similar cases against Serono and Amgen.

If further rulings go in Ruggeri’s favor, all sales reps at BI during the period of the suit could be eligible for overtime back pay at time and a half.

UPDATE: Download the ruling here. (The court’s website is currently nonfunctional. BNET will bring you a copy of the ruling as soon as it becomes available.) The suit contains some interesting information about sales rep life at Boehringer, and the judge clearly regards reps as people who do little more than parrot corporate scripts:

In preparation for meeting with targets, PSRs [pharma sales reps] are given a book which lists the drugs to be promoted to the physician and set forth “what the message [is] going to be for that drug, that [PSRs] were to consistently use those words verbatim to the physician.” … [Reps] may not alter this core message, which often consists of a short slogan or phrase.

The ruling, made several weeks ago but largely ignored in the media, is the subject of an ongoing debate among reps as to whether they should join the suit or not. Ruggeri is unpopular with at least one rep at BI. Here’s a rant on Cafe Pharma:

Look, let’s be honest. Just how many weeks do you truly put in 40 hours? Have you not realized that you are only going to walk away w/a few thousand dollars at best while the lawyers haul off the majority of the award/settlement?

Do us all a favor that still work at BI — resign and drop this frivolous suit. Life is not always about me, me, me. If you don’t like what you do and feel you are overpaid, please try to find another job out there with the same benefits, compensation and autonomy.

This person will, presumably, not cash the overtime check in the event that Ruggeri is ultimately victorious. In the meantime, the court’s docket shows that dozens of reps have signed “consent to sue” forms. Looks like they’re lining up for their payout.

Hat tip to InternetDrugNews.com, which saw the story first.

referensi : bnet.com

“Tylenol Man” Had Bizarre Fear of Robots

You’re probably already aware that the FBI has reopened its investigation into the Tylenol cyanide poisonings of 1982, and that the probe is focused on a search of the apartment of suspect James W. Lewis. But have you checked out Lewis’s web site and seen his strange essay on how robots will one day take over the world?

You can read it here. The gist of it is (spelling in the original):

… three choices will soon face all of humanity:
* 1. Robotopia : replaces all human labor and entrepreneurs with global welfare and all humans live happy lives.(or)
* 2. Technological Freeze : a new Dark Ages of sorts preserves human jobs and capitalism.(or)
* 3. Mass Annihilation: elimination of non-producing humans eliminates free loader demand.

So, we humans seem to have a tiny little probelm. How do we get to Robotopia and beyond before the capitalists chop up the robots or kill the would be freeloaders? Does collision lies dead ahead?

The artwork shown here was displayed on Lewis’s web page. The green ghost striding over Boston is especially disturbing in light of the crimes to which Lewis has been linked. The file name on that photo is “webmanboston.”

Note the cartoons are copyrighted to “Lewis.” He’s not a bad artist. Just a bad man (Lewis was convicted of extortion in the Tylenol cases, but not the murders that accompanied them.)

referensi:bnet.com

The 10 Weirdest Drug Stories of the Month

Another month has passed so it’s time once again to look at the pharmaceutical news that didn’t deserve a headline but was still too strange to be ignored. Here are BNET’s 10 Weirdest Drug Stories of October 2008:

1. Malaria cure is now cherry flavored
   Novartis has developed a fruit-favored version of Coartem, its malaria treatment. It hopes the pill will be more palatable to children, who dislike the regular version or eating it when it is crushed.
2. Mysterious ‘lung liquefying’ death of Sepracor worker
   A man working at Sepracor’s Windsor lab in Canada commuted home from work and then dropped dead. The man identified the chemical he had been working with as trimethylsilyl diazomethane. He started coughing and his symptoms progressed “from cold and flu-like symptoms to ‘difficulty in breathing, coughing, then coughing blood, lung liquefying, and ultimately, death.’”
3. Heart disease researchers discover gene for baldness ‘as a lark’
   Scientists at McGill who were looking at heart disease noticed that there seemed to be a correlation between baldness in men and risk for the condition. “So as a lark, we decided we would try to find the genes that increase people’s susceptibility to male-pattern baldness,” says Dr. Brent Richards, an assistant professor in the departments of medicine and human genetics at McGill.
4. Nail fungus has a new enemy
   Not everyone can be fighting cancer or HIV. Someone has look at the humble human nail fungus (or onychomycosis, to give its full title). HemCon is developing a new topical treatment it thinks is better than what’s currently on the market. The 6 to 8 percent of humanity that suffers from grody nails will benefit if HemCon can get this through the FDA. Did someone say fast track?
5. Pfizer pfinds a powder inhaler that actually works … kinda
   Like Exubera never happened, Pfizer is still pushing ahead in the hopes that inhaled powder delivery devices will be the Next Big Thing. This time the company has its hopes up for the Spiriva Handihaler, a treatment for chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. Spiriva sustained improvements in lung function but did not reduce the accelerated rate of decline in lung function. Unfortunately the latter was the primary endpoint and the former the secondary. So … don’t hold your breath.
6. Novartis has a drug for ‘easy dog punishment’
   Novartis has a training course for human trainers of dogs, in which the humans are trained to recognize separation anxiety in dogs. And then they’re trained to give the dogs Clomicalm, the Huxley-esque drug that stops the pooches from barking, whining and all those other behaviors that dog owners dislike. (A cynic might suggest that we humans have simply become worse as pet owners, but hey, this is the pharma business we’re talking about.) Dog trainer Ami Moore says “separation anxiety in dogs can occur not only when the dog is separated from a loved one, but also during times of uncertainty and times when he or she senses that punishment may be looming.” Now, if only there were a drug for humans that could stop them buying dogs unless they have the time and energy to train them properly …
7. Bristol-Myers Squibb helicopter crashes in New York
   The company gave up its fleet of jets in September, but apparently not its helicopters. One of them made a hard landing in the Big Apple, clipping a tail rotor. Coming in November: bad news for BMS’s hovercraft operations …
8. Wealthy, well-connected Dem fundraiser gets special access to Tysabri
   Fred Baron, the man who funneled cash to Sen. John Edwards‘ mistress, got his hands on some of Biogen Idec’s Tysabri in a last-ditch attempt to treat his blood cancer. Tysabri isn’t approved for that use and the company wouldn’t let him have it. He’s dying so he doesn’t care whether it works or not. Baron got their drug after ex-President Bill Clinton and cyclist Lance Armstrong intervened on his behalf.
9. Woman finds drug industry not fun; gives it up for dogs
   Diane Wheeler spent 30 years working for Big Pharma, but promised herself she would be doing something “fun” when she was 50. She left to start her own high-end dog care store. Wheeler was a data analyst for Elan and Allergan. In 2001, she moved to San Diego County. “That entrepreneurial experience emboldened the dog lover to try her hand with a Dogtopia franchise. And sitting in the courtyard play area of her business, which opened over the summer, Wheeler was animated as she pointed out doggie cots, play gyms and a bone-shaped wading pool,” per the San Diego Union-Tribune.
10. FDA appoints Wolfe to help guard the chickens
    Sydney Wolfe has been a longtime critic of the drug industry and the FDA, often arguing that new drugs should be approved unless they can demonstrate a superior safety profile than existing ones. He was formerly* remains employed at Public Citizen’s Health Research Group. And now he’s on the FDA’s Drug Safety & Risk Management Advisory Committee. Given how heavily lobbied the FDA is, the “weird” part of this story is how Wolfe was allowed in the door …
    

referensi :bnet.com

What Is Operations Research?

In the simplest terms, operations research (OR) is the process of using sophisticated analytics to tackle complex business problems. But to the growing number of companies that rely on massive amounts of data to efficiently run their businesses — everyone from Google to Hertz — OR is a secret weapon. Gone are the days when executives’ instincts determined when a product should launch or how much inventory should fill store shelves. Now, tools like enterprise-scale simulation and risk-assessment software — along with a core team of number crunchers known as “quants” — are arguably as important to a business’ overall success as its most-trusted execs.

Why It Matters Now

The list of Fortune 500 companies getting into the OR game is expanding, says Mark Doherty, executive director of the Hanover, Md.-based Institute for Operations Research and Management Sciences. Complex, global organizations are constantly in need of better ways to manage their processes, resources, products, and people, he says. OR allows these companies to do exactly that and find a competitive advantage. “In the private sector, OR is the secret weapon that helps companies tackle complex problems in manufacturing, supply chain management, health care, and transportation,” he says. For example, Procter & Gamble doesn’t make any significant analyses on supply chain structure without input from the OR team, since improving the slightest of margins in a company of P&G’s size can generate huge dividends.Other sectors, too, are increasingly relying on analytics. “In government, OR helps the military create and evaluate strategies,” says Doherty. “It also helps the Department of Homeland Security develop models of terrorist threats. That’s why OR is increasingly referred to as the ‘science of better.’”

The Strong Points

One of the myths about OR is that it applies only to operational issues. But OR is a cross-functional discipline that can apply to anything from executive compensation and new product branding to inventory management and organizational design. Plus, thanks to exponentially more powerful computers and next-generation software, data gathering that used to take months can now be performed with the click of a button.

The Weak Spots

Off-the-shelf software for optimization, simulation, and other OR techniques often comes with the promise of solving any complex problem, but there is no one-size-fits-all solution. What these software packages lack is “company intelligence” — data that’s specific to the nature of a particular company’s problems and challenges, says Glenn Wegryn, one of P&G’s top data crunchers. Thus, companies like P&G must rely heavily on customized, project-specific tools developed in-house, as well as a cadre of data analysts to target particular problems.

Case Study

Every product at P&G requires a variety of materials obtained from hundreds of sources worldwide. Using OR techniques, Wegryn’s team analyzes which source is optimal for every product. “A lot of times, there are service and quality considerations,” he says. “We also measure whether a manufacturer really has the capability to deliver the materials at the quoted price.” For instance, retail clients of P&G spend $140 million per year on in-store displays for P&G brands in the United States alone, often buying the display from one vendor. By using OR to determine the best source via a Web interface, P&G now pockets nearly $67 million annually in cost savings and has slashed the order-and-delivery cycle for store displays from 20 weeks to eight.

Additional reporting by Andrew Hines and Jake Swearingen.

referensi:bnet.com

Smart Design Guides Eyes to the Most Important Content...

It’s well established that Web users skim, rather than read, content online, so a site’s design needs to direct users’ eyes to the most important content. “People are extremely good at screening out things and focusing in on a small number of salient page elements,” usability expert Jakob Nielsen said in a 2006 eye-tracking study his company released.

The Obama home page relies primarily on color to highlight the featured content. Mendell cites the subtle gradient from dark blue to a lighter blue around the top border of each page, which creates a visual effect of pushing the most important content forward. Limiting the accent color to one — a bright red — allows the Donate button to really jump out.

The layout of the home page also helps guide those eyeballs. Divided into a grid, with the left column taking up two-thirds of the page and the right column taking up one-third, the structure reflects how users will actually use the site. Says Mendell, “The left-hand side is about content consumption, and the right-hand side allows user participation.”

For more tactics managers can steal, read Marketing Secrets of Campaign '08.

referensi:bnet.com