Prepare to be blinded with science, as Science.Ars returns from a hiatus. Jonathan Gitlin takes a tour through some of the week's news from the world of science and takes a look at the withdrawal of the popular antiinflammatory drug Vioxx from the US market. Did the FDA drop the ball on this one?
Two years after approving the drug for use in humans, an FDA advisory committee suggested that the increase in cardiovascular side effects warranted a new clinical trial to determine the risk, especially given that the target patient group (osteoarthritis) frequently had coexisting cardiovascular disease. Instead Merck began a media blitz, releasing press release after press release and spending US$100 million a year on direct to consumer marketing to assure that Vioxx was safe. Coming on the heels of the recent hearings over the prescribing of SSRIs to children, this must only raise further questions over the FDA and whether in recent years it has become too close to the drug companies it is intended to regulate.
Beyond Vioxx, Science.Ars has news on a bird-like dinosaur fossil, square bacteria, and just in time for the flu season, the 1918 flu pandemic. Research into that particularly virulent strain responsible for the deaths of over 20 million has produced some insights that may prove valuable today.

http://arstechnica.com/columns/scien...e-20041017.ars