Catherine, I expect one of the LGND pops to come in the 3 week to 3 month range. If announcements come on time, I expect LGND to hit 30 this year.
Today Reuters has an article on a worldwide diabetes epidemic. Although speakers at the conference emphasize a change in life style, for many, taking a Rezulin and Targretin capsule each morning would be a much more likely scenario.
Here's the article:
Experts Warn of Diabetes
Becoming Epidemic
By Maggie Fox
HELSINKI (Reuter) - Diabetes, a leading cause of death in
many countries, is becoming a truly global epidemic, experts
told a conference in Helsinki on Monday.
Drug therapy for the illness has improved little since insulin
injections were developed in 1921 and the best hope is to
change the way people live, they said.
Diabetes affects at least 135 million people worldwide. By
2025, the World Health Organization predicts, that number
will reach 300 million.
``I think we can truly say that the epidemic is here and now,''
Paul Zimmett, chief executive officer of the International
Diabetes Institute, told a news conference.
``Unless we do something dramatic, I expect diabetes to be
one of the major killers in the world in the year 2010,'' said
Jack Jervell, president of the International Diabetes
Federation.
``What is bothering me is that developing countries will bear
the brunt of this epidemic,'' he told the 9,000 delegates to the
16th International Diabetes Congress.
Jervell said complications from diabetes killed 2.8 million
people around the world every year. About 10 percent of
victims have type-one or insulin-dependent diabetes, which is
often genetic in origin. The rest have type-two or
non-insulin-dependent diabetes (NIDDM).
It kills by causing heart disease or kidney failure and, if
untreated or poorly treated, can cause blindness or vascular
problems that lead to damage of the limbs, and other
complications.
Zimmett said that up to half of all people with diabetes did
not even know they had it. Symptoms are vague -- tiredness,
thirst and a need to urinate frequently are common as the
body tries to flush away excess blood sugar that builds up as
the pancreas fails to produce insulin.
By the time damage to tissue and blood vessels that marks
the disease shows up, it can be too late.
People who were not at risk before were now developing
diabetes, Zimmett added. While diabetes used to hit mostly
those over the age of 50, cases were becoming common
among people in their 20s and 30s.
Rates were soaring in populations that are suddenly
becoming modern and westernised, such as Australian
aborigines, Pacific islanders, native Americans and even
among black children.
``Our black population have a shocking rate of death from
diabetes,'' Zimmett, a professor at Australia's Monash
University, said.
``The majority of new cases will be of type-two diabetes and
will be in China, the Indian subcontinent and Africa,'' he
added.
But the traditional medical approach of controlling diabetes
with a low-fat, low-sugar diet, moderate exercise, and careful
monitoring did not work with these new populations.
``They think their diabetes is due to the fact that the white
man has taken away their lifestyle,'' Zimmett said.
A better answer would be for societies to change -- to
encourage minority populations to stick more to their
traditional ways, he said.
``I don't think bringing in more drugs is going to help,'' he
added.
Jervell called for even broader changes in all societies, with a
renewed emphasis on exercise and healthy diet.
^REUTER@ Reut06:44 07-21-97
(21 Jul 1997 06:45 EDT)
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