Category Archives: Drugs

2 April 2013 Last updated at 16:44 ET A West Yorkshire Police detective has been found guilty of stealing seized drugs and conspiring with his brother to sell them, making at least 600,000. Nicholas McFadden stole thousands of pounds of class A drugs from evidence stores, Leeds Crown Court heard. He denied the two charges but pleaded guilty to money laundering. His brother, Simon McFadden, 41, was found guilty of conspiring to supply. Simon's wife Karen McFadden pleaded guilty to money laundering. After the verdict, Det Ch Insp Nick Wallen, of West Yorkshire Police, said McFadden "was, in fact, a criminal purporting to be a police officer". "Some police officers, Nicholas McFadden's former colleagues, had risked their lives to take drugs off the streets, and he, along with his brother, was putting them back there," he said. Nicholas McFadden, 38, of Church Avenue, Leeds, worked for a special organised crime group and was in charge of looking after evidence, the jury was told. Leeds Crown Court heard the detective constable, who joined the force in 2000, helped himself to heroin, cocaine and cannabis by exploiting "slack" procedures at secret evidence stores. When police raided his family home in Castleford they … Continue reading →

By Kathryn Doyle NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Teens and preteens with a parent deployed in the military may be more likely to binge drink or misuse prescription drugs, according to a new study. Previous studies have found that with a parent's multiple deployments come higher levels of depression and more thoughts of suicide among children. But the new study is the first to focus on alcohol and drug use, senior author Stephan Arndt told Reuters Health. "What was sort of surprising to me was that I had expected those effects for high school (students), but we saw it in sixth graders too," said Arndt, a psychiatry researcher at the University of Iowa in Iowa City. Arndt and his colleagues analyzed statewide survey data from Iowa students in 2010, when 1.2 million American children had a parent in the active duty military. They compared data from 1,700 kids of deployed parents and 57,000 kids from non-military families, including sixth, eighth and 11th graders. Twelve percent of sixth graders with a deployed parent had tried alcohol and seven percent had consumed five or more drinks in one sitting, compared to four and two percent of children of non-military parents, respectively. Among … Continue reading →

SAN DIEGO, April 2, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- Health insurers should use both medical and pharmacy data to forecast specialty drug costs which are predicted to rise to 50 percent of commercially insured total drug costs by 2018, according to a new study by pharmacy benefit manager Prime Therapeutics (Prime). The study will be presented today at the Academy of Managed Care Pharmacy (AMCP)'s 25th Annual Meeting & Expo in San Diego. The study found that in 2009, specialty drugs those that require special handling, are typically injected, and are more expensive than traditional drugs represented 20 percent of all drug (medical and pharmacy benefit) costs. In addition, by September 2012, specialty drugs increased to 28.7 percent of the total costs. Based on average increases in recent years, researchers predict specialty costs will increase 15 percent per year, while non-specialty costs will remain flat. As a result, specialty costs are expected to make up 50 percent of the overall drug costs by 2018, for commercially insured individuals. Patrick Gleason, PharmD, FCCP, BCPS, director of health outcomes at Prime, explains, "The increasing rate of specialty drugs expenses is due to increased non-specialty generic drug use; expected continued pharmaceutical manufacturer, annual, double-digit price … Continue reading →

By Dana Ford, CNN updated 2:26 AM EDT, Wed April 3, 2013 Patients at four Ontario hospitals received lower-than-intended doses of two cancer drugs, officials said. STORY HIGHLIGHTS (CNN) -- Close to 1,200 patients in Canada got lower-than-intended doses of chemotherapy drugs, officials said Tuesday, in a case that is sure to upset those patients and raise concerns about how potentially life-saving drugs are handled. Cancer Care Ontario, a government agency, reported that 990 patients were affected at four hospitals: London Health Sciences Centre, Windsor Regional Hospital, Lakeridge Health and Peterborough Regional Health Centre. Another 186 patients were underdosed at Saint John Regional Hospital in New Brunswick, said hospital spokeswoman Janet Hogan. The drugs in question were bought by the hospitals from a supplier that produces and labels the medications, according to Cancer Care Ontario. The supplier was identified as Marchese Hospital Solutions, a company spokesman said. "We are, of course deeply concerned whenever any question is raised about the quality of our work," the company said in a statement. "Our preliminary investigation of this issue leads us to be confident that we have met the quality specifications of the contract we are honored to have been awarded." Go here … Continue reading →

Don't Stand With Rand? Gun Control and Pot "The one thing a violent rapist deserves is to face is a good woman with a gun!" That was Wayne LaPierre, executive director of the National Rifle Associatio... By: TheYoungTurks … Continue reading →

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Rafiq Maqbool / AP Ranjit Shahani, vice chairman and managing director of Novartis India, speaks during a news conference in Mumbai on April 1, 2013 In a decisive victory for Indias pharmaceutical industry, Indias Supreme Court rejected Novartis patent application for the cancer drug Glivec on Monday, ending a seven-year battle by the Swiss drugmaker to get a patent in India on its powerful leukemia drug. The medication, which was approved for use in the U.S. back in 2001, has been produced generically by Indian pharmaceuticals for years at a fraction of the Swiss drugs cost. The Indian drug industrys victory, however, is being described as a stunning defeat for intellectual-property rights and may have repercussions on Indias attempts to attract foreign investment. Nevertheless, health activists have called the top courts decision a win for patients seeking cheaper treatment and against evergreening, the alleged practice of making minor tweaks to an existing drug to prolong a companys hold on a patent and protect it from being produced by other firms as a cheaper generic version once the patent has expired. The ruling was met with enthusiasm by Indian drug manufacturers, which produce a generic version of Glivec, or Gleevec, as … Continue reading →

New partnerships could help bring a novel class of biopharmaceutical to patients. Messenger RNAsmolecules that carry information between the genome and the protein-building machinery of cellscould become the next big class of biopharmaceutical drug. These molecules were once thought unusable as drugs because they are notoriously fragile and could rouse an inflammatory immune response. Now, thanks to several recent scientific discoveries, they are attracting the increasing attention of pharmaceutical companies. Recently, the pharmaceutical heavyweight AstraZeneca announced it would pay Moderna Therapetuics $240 million for rights to the startups mRNA technology, which it will use to develop treatments for cardiovascular, metabolic, and cancer patients. Inside a cell, mRNA serves as an intermediary between DNA-encoding genes and their protein products. As a drug, an mRNA would supply the biological instructions for producing a protein inside cells, perhaps a protein that replaces a missing or broken version inherited as part of a genetic disorder. In some ways, an mRNA would be more efficient than DNA-based gene therapy (which would require the cells to make their own mRNA intermediary before producing a protein) and more effective than recombinant protein therapy. While several companies are developing therapeutic gene-silencing RNAs, which inhibit damaging proteins from being … Continue reading →

A nine-year-old boy was caught selling drugs to primary and high school learners, a Tshwane metro police officer said. The police officer told Die Beeld that the Centurion boy had been selling drugs for his parents. The incident highlighted the availability of drugs at primary schools, where Grade seven learners were often selling the drugs to the younger children. According to Tshwane metro police inspector, Sidney de Wet, many primary school teachers did not know what signs to look for when searching for drugs. "The schools often dont know which signs to look out for - like dagga, which makes eyes turn red, nyope which brings about sleepiness and Cat, which makes users aggressive." According to an education expert at the University of the Free State, many primary school children used drugs. The expert also revealed that a study of high school pupils in Gauteng, the Free State and the Eastern Cape showed that drug use was prevalent with 58% regularly using dagga at school while 38% said other drugs were used on school property. View original post here: Boy (9) sells drugs at school … Continue reading →

Chandigarh, April 1 (IANS) Having busted an international drugs racket worth millions of dollars operating from Punjab, police said Monday that there is a Chinese connection to the crime. The drugs racket has already been linked to the UK, the Netherlands, Canada, and Afghanistan-Pakistan. Police said five Chinese associates had visited Chandigarh in 2010 for a quality check of methamphetamine, a substance known as "Ice" in rave party circles, and pseudophedrine, which is used as raw material in the manufacture of Ice. "The identity of the Chinese visitors has been established; further action is being taken," a police spokesman said here Monday. No further details of the Chinese men have been disclosed so far, pending investigation. Since the first seizure of over 28 kg heroin March 7, Punjab Police claimed to have seized huge quantities of drugs, including lifestyle drugs used in parties, from various places. Based on international prices for these drugs, police said the haul was valued at Rs.484 crore. The Fatehgarh Sahib district police had Sunday recovered 10 kg of "Ice" and 230 kg of pseudophedrine. The latest seizures were made from Panchkula (near Chandigarh), Patiala and Sangrur. Police say international boxer Vijender Singh consumed heroin 12 … Continue reading →