Virtual Memories

I’m probably just punchy, but I laughed over just about every entry.

I’m writing up my profile of Aventis, going over the company’s late-stage drug pipeline to see what might be a good revenue source, when I come across a drug called Sculptra. What is it meant to treat, I wonder?

“Indication: Facial lipoatrophy”

Okay. I’m a smart guy. I guess it means “fat in the face is wearing out.” But I HAVE to look it up to see what it’s all about.

And now I know.

Okay, so I lied. Here’s a piece from the Sunday Washington Post on the genocide in Sudan.

Over at the NYTimes, Nicholas Kristof provides a list of Sudan relief organizations you can donate to, as well as links to writing your Reps & Senators.

Now back to comparing AstraZeneca’s pipeline development to the Indiana Pacers’ rebuild-on-the-fly strategy from 2000-2001 . . .

No blogging for me. I’m sick as a dog (summer colds suck), and have to put together the annual Top Companies report (top 20 pharma, top 10 biopharma) for my magazine.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to explain why last year’s optimism about Merck was misguided . . .

A leader of Poland’s Solidarity movement gave an interview to Dissent recently, explaining his support for the war in Iraq:

[W]e know what dictatorship is. And in the conflict between totalitarian regimes and democracy you must not hesitate to declare which side you are on. Even if a dictatorship is not an ideal typical one, and even if the democratic countries are ruled by people whom you do not like. I think you can be an enemy of Saddam Hussein even if Donald Rumsfield is also an enemy of Saddam Hussein.

. . .

[W]ho was worse, Ronald Reagan or Leonid Brezhnev? If I were American I would never have voted for Reagan, but as a Pole, I liked the tough position of Reagan toward Brezhnev. Perhaps Reagan did not quite understand what he was doing, and maybe Bush doesn’t understand either. But the facts are that, suddenly, Libya has begun to speak a different language. Syria has begun to speak a different language. Even North Korea has started to speak a different language. This is not to say that Bush is always right. Of course not. But you must see the hierarchy of threats, of dangers. I asked my French and German friends, Are you afraid that tomorrow Bush will bomb Paris? And can you really be sure that terrorists and fundamentalists will not attack the Louvre? So which side are you on?

Read more.

Wow. I come across this take on the Iraqi flag during breakfast this morning, then I get an e-mail from new VM reader Nancy with a great link critiquing flags from all over the world (Angola: Machete on flag nicely depicted but not wise idea).

Enjoy.

PS: Cut me some slack, okay? I don’t have a lot of blogging-time at present, as I’m busting ass on the Top 20 Pharma Companies report at my magazine. And it was either this or a rant about the report on how 10 million women continue to have pap smears after they’ve had hysterectomies. Which is to say, they’re getting tested for cancer in organs THEY NO LONGER HAVE. And people complain that drug companies are fucking up healthcare costs? Grumblegrumblegrumble . . .

Update: Both my girlfriend and my mom called to complain about this entry, because not every hysterectomy includes removal of the cervix. Now, notwithstanding the fucked-up freudian issues involved in those two people calling me to discuss this subject, I want to note that the NYTimes article on this subject indicates that the 10 million women in the study don’t include that sub-population. So, yeah, there are 10 million women getting checked for cancer in organs they don’t have. There are also 1.1 million who’ve had hysterectomies and retained their cervixes. They should still get pap smears. Right now.

As I mentioned a few weeks ago, I’ve never watched a movie or read a book by Michael Moore. It looks like Christopher Hitchens has, and he’s not happy about what he’s seen.

What’s tough for me is that I wanted to cite the following line from Hitch’s “review” of Moore’s new “documentary”:

Fahrenheit 9/11 is a sinister exercise in moral frivolity, crudely disguised as an exercise in seriousness. It is also a spectacle of abject political cowardice masking itself as a demonstration of “dissenting” bravery.

Unfortunately, he totally topped himself when he called out Moore for quoting George Orwell:

A short word of advice: In general, it’s highly unwise to quote Orwell if you are already way out of your depth on the question of moral equivalence. It’s also incautious to remind people of Orwell if you are engaged in a sophomoric celluloid rewriting of recent history.

All of which is to say: read it!