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Sebelius on Vaccines

24 Nov 2009

Discussing whether a new $487M investment from the government will help speed up the production of the most important vaccines, with Kathy Sebelius, Health & Human Services secretary and CNBC's Mike Huckman.

The New Formula for Faster Vaccines

24 Nov 2009

Novartis is opening on Tuesday the country's first plant to produce flu vaccines using cell cultures. These vaccines are faster, better and cheaper to make than egg-based methods, reports CNBC's Mike Huckman.

Novartis Opens 1st US Plant for Flu Vaccine

24 Nov 2009

Cholesterol Drug Battle: Niaspan vs. Zetia 16 Nov 2009
Abbott Laboratories' Niaspan beat Merck's Zetia in a new study. CNBC's Mike Huckman has the details.

Cardiologist Grades Cholesterol Drug Study

16 Nov 2009

Abbott Laboratories' Niaspan beat Merck's Zetia in a new study. Dr. Steven Nissen, chairman of the Department of Cardiovascular Medicine at The Cleveland Clinic, shares his reaction with CNBC's Mike Huckman.

Merck's Cholesterol Drugs Under Pressure

16 Nov 2009

A new study is putting Merck's cholesterol drugs under pressure today, reports CNBC's Mike Huckman, with Ken Frazier, Merck Global Human Health president.

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CNBC ON DIGG

Merck Puts That Drug Back On The Shelf

Published: Friday, 5 Jun 2009 | 12:50 PM ET

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By: Mike Huckman
Reporter

Risky Business
Source: imdb.com
Risky Business
"It's a risky business." I don't think I'll ever forget when a Chief Financial Officer said that at an investor conference last year in lieu of reading the whole boring boilerplate "Safe Harbor Statement."

It's the SEC-mandated preamble to public comments made by officials of publicly-traded companies basically warning people who are listening to take everything they say with a grain of salt. Instead, this guy just flashed the "Safe Harbor" legalese on the screen and said, "It's a risky business." Loved it.

But this morning drug giant Merck is living it.

The Dow component announced that a heart drug didn't work in a big, late-stage clinical trial and it won't be filing for FDA approval of the drug this year as it had previously forecast. A Phase 3 study is typically the last one before asking regulatory authorities for permission to sell a product. MRK paid $366 million for the drug and the private company that discovered it less than two years ago. Not a heckuva lot of cash for a company the size of Merck [MRK Loading... () ], but not peanuts either. Now, possibly money down the drain.

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The stock is lower on the news, but as I write this it's well of its lows. In a research note to clients headlined, "Another Pipeline Drug (A Smaller One At Least) Bites The Dust," Bernstein pharma analyst Dr. Tim Anderson says he didn't even have the drug in his financial models, so maybe that explains why the market's reaction is a little more muted than you'd expect it to be when a Phase 3 clinical trial blows up. This pipeline setback comes on the heels of another one for a Merck migraine drug earlier this Spring. Dr. Anderson calls it a "psychological negative" and says it's a good thing MRK is acquiring Schering-Plough.[SGP Loading... () ] "The need for MRK to buy SGP is greater than ever," he writes. One of the guys on the Bernstein research team or someone in his family owns MRK stock and a part of the company owns more than one percent of the shares.

One of the things Merck has going for it is its relatively new diabetes pill franchise of Januvia and Janumet. The company will be presenting new test results on the drugs at the American Diabetes Association meeting in New Orleans this weekend.

I'll be reporting live from there Monday morning starting with an exclusive interview with Amylin Pharmaceuticals [AMLN Loading... () ] CEO Dan Bradbury at approximately 9:40 ET on "Squawk On The Street."