GSK is spending up to $1.5bn on new medicines for its HIV business ViiV Healthcare December 18, 2015 GSK is spending a huge sum on building up its HIV business, ViiV Healthcare. Today, the pharmaceutical giant announced a deal to buy up to$1.5bn (£1bn) worth of research assets from American company Bristol-Myers Squibb, in a series of deals due to take place next year. Initially it will pay $317m for medicines in late-stage [...]
That Christmas feeling: Scientists have located the “Christmas spirit” in our brains December 17, 2015 That warm, fuzzy, Christmassy feeling we get every December is not just in our imagination – it's a physiological change that can actually be located in our brains. A study published in the Christmas edition of the British Medical Journal shows how the “Christmas Spirit” is present in five different areas of the brain during [...]
Most people think women are controlled by their hormones at work December 17, 2015 In the work place, there are some ingrained gender stereotypes that just won't shift, according to new research by Expert Market, and one of them is the impact hormones have on the work performance of women. In a survey of more than 2,000 people from offices across the UK, 54 per cent of people said [...]
AstraZeneca buys majority stake in biopharma company Acerta for $4bn December 17, 2015 AstraZeneca has agreed to buy a majority stake of biopharma company Acerta for $4bn (£2.7bn), with the hope of expanding and improving its portfolio of medicines. Once the transaction goes ahead, the British pharmaceutical giant will take over 55 per cent of the private-owned company, which is based in the US and Netherlands. Acerta focuses [...]
Whether we get cancer is mostly down to lifestyle factors, not bad luck December 17, 2015 It's an ongoing question – how much is cancer caused by genetic factors outside our control, and how much is it the result of the environment we put ourselves in? Now, researchers at the Stony Brook Cancer Centre in New York think they've worked out how much of a role each influencer plays, and their [...]
It’s official: English people do not have worse teeth than Americans December 17, 2015 The popular belief that English people have terrible teeth compared to other nationalities is wrong, it turns out. In a study comparing the oral health of English and American people, researchers found real no difference between the two. In fact, in some ways English people have better teeth – Americans are more likely to have [...]
Astronaut Tim Peake sends us a message from the International Space Station December 16, 2015 Major Tim Peake has sent a message down to Earth during his first full day at the International Space Station. The astronaut – the only one ever chosen by the European Space Agency (ESA) to go to space, took off from the Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan at just after 11am yesterday. He then spent six [...]
Roche breast cancer drug Kadclya ruled “too expensive” for NHS by Nice December 16, 2015 A life-extending drug for breast cancer sufferers has been described as “too expensive” for the NHS by Nice, the government's regulatory body for medicines. Kadcyla, which is owned by Roche, increases life expectancy of those with a progressed form of the disease by an average of six months. It is used in patients where the [...]
Iran sanction changes: There are difficulties ahead, but Europe should stay optimistic December 16, 2015 Today, the international business community hit an inevitable speed-bump on the way towards sanctions relief for Iran. Following the test-firing missile by the Iranian government in October, a UN Security Council experts panel declared Resolution 1929 was violated because the missile was capable of carrying a nuclear warhead. While this has led many, including the [...]
Has Tim Peake given you the space travel bug? Here’s what it takes to be an astronaut with Nasa December 16, 2015 If you felt a surge of jealousy while watching Tim Peake make his way to the International Space Station (ISS) yesterday, worry no more – Nasa has just opened applications for its latest space programme. And this time, you could end up travelling to Mars. The bad news is that its most recent application process was anything to [...]
