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Novo Nordisk CEO on Diabetes Epidemic

13 Nov 2009

Diabetes is a global epidemic that presents an estimated $25 billion drug and device market and some predict that number could double over the next several years. Lars Sorensen, CEO of Novo Nordisk, the world's largest diabetes care company, talks to CNBC's Mike Huckman.

Pharma & Social Media 12 Nov 2009
The FDA is holding meetings into big pharma's possible use of social media to sell their products. CNBC's Mike Huckman has the details.

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SNY Out with H1N1 Test Results 11 Nov 2009
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Making the Flu Vaccine 06 Nov 2009
Wayne Pisano, CEO of Sanofi-Pasteur, discusses the making of the flu vaccine with CNBC's Mike Huckman.

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CNBC ON DIGG

No ASCO Fiasco!

Published: Monday, 1 Jun 2009 | 1:58 PM ET

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By: Mike Huckman
Reporter

I'm happy to report that I'm scribbling out this blog from the air-conditioned comfort of the convention center in Orlando. It's the first time in my six or seven years of covering ASCO that the organization has let CNBC broadcast live from inside. And, guess what? No one seems freaked out about it.

PR folks and execs who worked with me at previous ASCOs are all reminiscing about days spent outside schvitzing, getting rained on and breathing in the exhaust from the parade of ASCO shuttle buses. No more.

The only time I might spend outside today will be poolside later at my hotel.

So, we've been rockin' and rollin' with the breaking news punches, quickly rescheduling interviews we had set up due to everything else happening in the world today. It's an extraordinary newsday and fortunately, all of the PR people and execs have been flexible and understanding about our airtime constraints.

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In a way, it's a good thing that this is what everyone agrees a relatively quiet ASCO. With Genentech's colon cancer study of Avastin missing its mark and the company having been taken over by Roche, this year's ASCO doesn't have the investor/trading mojo of years' past. Some folks think it could just be a retrenching year.

Speaking of Genentech, I'm told the recently ousted CEO Art Levinson was here, sans bodyguard. And so was the company's former head of product development, Dr. Susan Desmond-Hellmann, soon to be Chancellor of UC-San Francisco. She just came by our camera position to say, "Hi." Desond-Hellmann was an ASCO CNBC interview mainstay. This year we're talking to the guy who took her place, Dr. Hal Barron.

And one more ASCO nugget before I try to scarf down some lunch and prep for our afternoon coverage. This morning AstraZeneca [AZN Loading... () ] and Merck [MRK Loading... () ] announced they're hooking up to combine two experimental cancer drugs. It's a unique "two is better than one" deal they think could speed development. So, how did it come about? An AZN exec told me a MRK scientist was in the audience of an AZN data presentation at another scientific meeting. After hearing the results, he thought the two drugs might work well together. The scientist reached out to AZN and there you go.