Three strikes in pharma: Exploring recent drug withdrawals and clinical trial challenges

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Pharmaceutical companies face a long list of regulatory challenges ranging from patent expiry to bioequivalence and international harmonization. It’s not uncommon for drug makers to withdraw or discontinue drugs after failing to meet clinical requirements or endpoints, resulting in drug withdrawals. On average, life science companies pull roughly 4,500 drugs and devices from the market, many of which are widely used. In recent years, drug companies, for instance, have pulled a growing number of products for nitrosamine contamination. While the FDA can identify safety concerns, it often falls upon the manufacturer to initiate and execute a recall.

Here, we round up three recent examples of recent drug withdrawals where pharma companies either pulled drugs from the market or gave up on developing a drug for a given indication.

Covis Pharma withdraws Makena

The Zug, Switzerland–base…

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The top 5 pharma firms by reputation

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Recent research from reputation data specialist RepTrak (Boston) indicates that the pharma industry had the largest year-over-year reputational improvement of any sector, according to its roundup of top 100 corporations. The sector saw significant gains in consumers’ perception of its citizenship and governance. 

Now ranked eighth overall, the pharma industry came in just ahead of the consumer services industry and just behind the automobiles and components sector. 

The pharma industry began to see its reputation improve beginning in the second quarter of 2020, when the industry claimed a leading role in pandemic recovery, according to RepTrak.

In the Asia-Pacific region, the pharmaceutical sector has the highest reputation of any industry, according to RepTrak’s report. 

In creating the listing, RepTrack surveyed 68,577 people in 15 countries, asking them to a…

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