Latest Drugs Headlines

All the headlines from our Drugs Topic Page, ordered by recency.

Ohio Hospital: Doc Gave Excessive Pain Meds to Near-Death Patients, Suit Filed

Jan 18 2019 // An intensive care doctor ordered “significantly excessive and potentially fatal” doses of pain medicine for at least 27 near-death patients in the past few years after families asked that lifesaving measures be...

Different Rates of Opioid Prescriptions Linked to Worker, Employer, Injury Traits

Jan 11 2019 // Injured workers in mining and construction, those in rural counties or those who suffer fractures, carpal tunnel and neurologic spine pain are among those more likely to receive prescriptions for opioids than workers in...

Eli Lilly Posts Drug Price on Website But Not in TV Ads

Jan 11 2019 // Drugmaker Eli Lilly has started posting price information online for drugs advertised on TV.On Jan. 8, the company began running TV ads for a popular diabetes drug that don’t give the price but direct viewers to the...

Drug Advertising Drives $30 Billion Medical Industry Marketing Machine

Jan 11 2019 // Ads for prescription drugs appeared 5 million times in just one year, capping a recent surge in U.S. medical marketing, a new analysis found.The advertisements for various medicines showed up on TV, newspapers, online...

Supreme Court Justices Appear to Favor Merck in Drug Warning Case

Jan 9 2019 // U.S. Supreme Court justices on Monday appeared sympathetic to Merck & Co. in its bid to fend off hundreds of lawsuits accusing the company of failing to adequately warn patients of the risks of thigh bone fractures...

Sharp Drop in Drug Overdoses Reported in West Virginia County

Jan 9 2019 // A West Virginia county saw a more than 40 percent drop in the number of non-fatal drug overdoses last year as compared to 2017.The Huntington Herald-Dispatch reports just over 1,000 non-fatal overdoses were reported in...

California Governor Signs Order to Tackle Drug Prices in First Act

Jan 8 2019 // Hours into his new job, California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed an executive order on Monday that could dramatically reshape the way prescription drugs are paid for and acquired in the most populous U.S. state.The order, along...

First States to Legalize Marijuana See Rise in Car Insurance Claims, Research Shows

Jan 7 2019 // Crashes are up by as much as six percent in Colorado, Nevada, Oregon and Washington, compared with neighboring states that haven’t legalized marijuana for recreational use, according to research from the Insurance...

Reimagining Health Care After CVS Takeover of Aetna: Viewpoint

Dec 28 2018 // CVS Health Corp. CEO Larry Merlo is a 28-year veteran of the company who helped lead its transformation from a regional drugstore chain into a pharmacy giant. Now, after guiding CVS through its $69 billion acquisition of...

Delaware Judge Says Fired Medical Marijuana User Can Pursue Lawsuit

Dec 28 2018 // A Delaware judge has ruled that a medical marijuana user fired from his factory job after failing a drug test can pursue a lawsuit against his former employer.Jeremiah Chance was fired in 2016 from his job as a yard...

Data Show Car Accidents Up in States That First Legalized Marijuana

Dec 28 2018 // Crashes are up by as much as six percent in Colorado, Nevada, Oregon and Washington, compared with neighboring states that have not yet legalized marijuana for recreational use, according to research from the Insurance...

Report: DEA, Distributors Not Doing Enough to Fix West Virginia Opioid Crisis

Dec 27 2018 // A congressional report on prescription pill dumping in West Virginia blames U.S. prescription drug distributors and the Drug Enforcement Administration for not doing enough to help mitigate the nation’s opioid...

Former Insys CEO Babich Pleads Guilty to Opioid Prescription Bribe Scheme

Dec 27 2018 // The former chief executive of Insys Therapeutics Inc. has agreed to plead guilty to participating in a scheme to bribe doctors to prescribe a powerful opioid medication in order to boost its sales, U.S. prosecutors said on...

Judge Blocks New York from Enforcing Opioid Surcharge on Companies

Dec 21 2018 // A Manhattan federal judge blocked New York state from enforcing a recently enacted law that aimed to collect $600 million from drug manufacturers and distributors to defray the costs of combating the opioid addiction...

Big Pharma Resuming U.S. Price Hikes in January After Pause: Reuters Report

Dec 21 2018 // Novartis AG and Bayer AG are among nearly 30 drugmakers that have taken steps to raise the U.S. prices of their medicines in January, ending a self-declared halt to increases made by a pharma industry under pressure from...

Cigna Completes $54 Billion Acquisition of Express Scripts

Dec 21 2018 // Cigna Corp. on Thursday closed its $54-billion deal to buy Express Scripts Holding Co., creating one of the biggest providers of pharmacy benefits and insurance plans in the United States, a combination it says will help...

Reuters Special Report: J&J Knew About Asbestos in Baby Powder for Decades

Dec 17 2018 // Darlene Coker knew she was dying. She just wanted to know why.She knew that her cancer, mesothelioma, arose in the delicate membrane surrounding her lungs and other organs. She knew it was as rare as it was deadly, a...

Missouri’s Gov. Parson Pushing for Prescription Monitoring Bill

Dec 7 2018 // The long-futile effort seeking a statewide prescription drug monitoring program in Missouri now has a prominent advocate — Gov. Mike Parson.The Republican governor met Wednesday with St. Louis Mayor Lyda Krewson, doctors...

Troubled Opioid Seller Insys Looks to Cannabis to Save Itself

Dec 4 2018 // Sitting in a Boston courtroom in a dark, pinstriped suit, the former top sales executive at Insys Therapeutics Inc., Alex Burlakoff, listened as federal prosecutors read out crimes he and the company had allegedly...

Mass. Pot Shops May Be Open, but Workers Can Still Be Fired Over Weed

Nov 26 2018 // The long-awaited opening of the first recreational marijuana stores in Massachusetts was cheered by cannabis enthusiasts and entrepreneurs, but it doesn’t change the reality that workers can be fired or face...