Let me guess, Vitter and Breitbart get money from the maker of Avastin? Is the company connected to Republicans?

"noted pharmaceutical expert Andrew Breitbart"

holy crap, the judges just gave this line 10.0's across the board. brian, you are the mary lou of snark.

Captain Pampers strikes again.

Well, all pharmas are connected to the GOP, but I don't think Genentech is one of the more ideologically Republican companies -- they're supposed to be the Apple of the industry. Wouldn't be surprised if one of their gazillion lobbyists or flacks showed Vitter and Breitbart some love, tho

Follow the money, this douche doesn't open his yap unless he's getting paid, guaranteed

While we're at it, let's bring back Phen-Phen!

What is going in LA that allows Diaper David to be competitive for re-election? Why does he have even a shred of credibility? Any LA-folks with insights to share?

Sounds like they've never read about how drugs get approved. Vast majority of experimental meds wash out before becoming accepted. More short term self-interest and anti-intellectualism from the party that denies global warming.

"As tragic as it is for breast cancer patients today, this arbitrary shift is a preview of one of the tools in the government health care rationing toolbox," reads a column on Breitbart's site.
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Breitbart fails to mention that the United States has had massive rationing for decades, and the death panel doing the massive rationing is made up of the insurance company bureaucrats who decide who gets treatmant and what treatment they get, so it's the insurance company bureaucrats, not physicians, who make the medical decisions for American patients.

What the heck do these jerks know about pharmacology? Avastin was "fast-tracked" by the FDA, which means is they don't actually do a full assessment of effectiveness and safety because the people intended to use it have terminal disease (metastatic cancer), so they want to get the drug to these people as quickly as possible. Fast-tracked drugs frequently are shown later to not be very effective or do more harm than good.

Why Breitbart/Vitter seized this particular case to go all death-panely is beyond me. I guess they think it'll score them some points in the election, but last time I checked people are more worried about the economy and jobs than fictional death panels.

I think I will wait until Sarah Palin and Faux News weighs in on this compelling issue.

But if FDA advisory panels fit into the category of government regulations, then when the Republicans take control, all those will be eliminated. Then we will all be safe.

But the Vitter link is probably through Billy Tauzin. Billy Tauzin, the backslapping former Louisiana congressman who went on to earn $2 million a year as head of the drug industry's powerful Washington trade group, PhRMA, is stepping down from his post in June 2010.

If I were Melancon, I'd be out there hammering him with a message of "Vitter wants to waste billions on a drug that doesn't do shit for breast cancer patients -- all to help his drug company buddies. And people wonder why we've got deficits up the wazoo?"

I'm sorry to do this, but:

...but not because the FDA's accelerated approval of the drug in 2007 went against the medical advise of its advisory committee...

"advice," not "advise." Advise (əd-vīz) is a verb. Advice (əd-vīs) is a noun. When you advise someone, what you give them is advice.

As tragic as it is for breast cancer patients today, this arbitrary shift is a preview of one of the tools in the government health care rationing toolbox

By this standard, any government regulation of the pharmaceutical industry could be called "rationing."

As someone who's had a 20-year career marketing medical devices, on and off for big pharma companies, I can personally attest to big pharma's objectives in launching new drugs: Get them to market as fast as possible and make boatloads of money before the FDA pulls them off the market and/or the lawsuits begin to hit. They know how dangerous many of these drugs are long before they bring them to market. They still make way more money than they ever end up paying out in settlements. It's their business model.

Shorter Vitter - Who needs the FDA? You should have the absolute freedom to buy quacky patent medicines and die horribly from the complications. So long as you can't sue the company for selling it to you, seeing as how it was your free choice and all.

Ah, the hateful ho' hopper tells another twisted lie.