Vaccines news from FierceHealthcare

> Pharma giants Sanofi-Aventis and Bristol-Myers Squibb are preparing to battle a copycat generic to its Plavix brand. Read more...

> The FDA has conceded that maybe, just maybe, it will need more money if it's going to do a good job of inspecting foreign drug manufacture sites. Read more...

> Colorado has delayed plans to raise limits for judgments in malpractice suits. Report > Big news: It looks like federal authorities Read more...

> It appears that U.S. adults are largely avoiding several new vaccines that can prevent serious illness, according to a new survey. Read more...

> Medicare will soon begin testing personal health records with 100,000 beneficiaries in South Carolina. Read more...

This week, as part of my coverage of the Medical Group Management Association's annual meeting, I wrote about how hard it's getting to Read more...

After years of underfunding, this is now a great time for the vaccine business. Three new vaccines hit the market during 2006 alone, the most known for a single year, and costly new vaccines are likely to find acceptance this year. Vaccines released during 2006 include HPV, which has been linked to the development of cervical cancer, and rotavirus, which kills 600,000 children around the world. And the trend is likely to continue, experts say. Technology breakthroughs, boosted by higher …

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Twenty years ago, there were four vaccines for kids. The cost was $100 or less for all of them, and the schedule was straightforward. Now there are 12--soon to be 13 with the newly recommended HPV vaccine for girls--and the costs have skyrocketed to $1,250. While insurance generally covers vaccines, the poor and uninsured are worrying disease-control experts, who fear that government coverage can't keep up. And diseases like mumps and whooping cough have been breaking out even among the …

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It looks as though there will be no repeat of the flu vaccine shortages of the past few years. Vaccine makers say they are on track to produce at least 100 million doses of flu vaccine in time for next year's flu season. That's far better than the 86 million doses that producers managed for the 2005-2006 season. The estimates came as vaccine manufacturers, public health officials and influenza experts met in Chicago for the National Influenza Vaccine Summit. Officials say they want to …

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Flu season is pretty much over, the CDC said this week. Overall flu and pneumonia deaths this year were far below an average year. Officials say that's partly because this year's season was a mild one but also because the vaccines on the market did a better job than usual. The CDC reports active influenza in less than half of the states. There was less positive news in the fine print. Authorities say this year's Type A virus is resistant to both rimantadine and amantadine. Also of …

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