STAT+: Pharmalittle: Chinese drugmakers develop copycat weight loss drugs; SEC eyes supplier of research monkeys
Chinese pharmaceutical companies are developing domestic versions of “miracle” weight-loss drugs.
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Chinese pharmaceutical companies are developing domestic versions of “miracle” weight-loss drugs as they take on Western drugmakers selling anti-obesity medication in one of the world’s biggest markets, The Financial Times tells us. The Chinese companies hope to compete with the Danish pharma group Novo Nordisk’s pioneering drugs in China, which has the world’s largest overweight and diabetic population. If successful, they could also potentially offer a cheaper alternative in the West. Novo Nordisk’s semaglutide, or Ozempic, dominates the market, but dozens of medicines using the same mechanism are undergoing clinical trials in China, according to analysts.
A U.S. government probe into a monkey-smuggling operation emanating from Cambodia has gone in a new direction as the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission examines whether Inotiv, a key importer, complied with a federal law that governs bribing foreign officials, STAT writes. The company — which is a major supplier of non-human primates to corporate, government, and academic research laboratories — received a voluntary request last May for documents dating back to December 2017 about importing non-human primates from Asia, according to a regulatory filing. And the SEC wants to know whether Inotiv complied with the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act.
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