Content about Drug Fix

NEW YORK NBTY CEO Harvey Kamil’s appearance on the “Fox Business Morning C-Suite Sit-Down” is good news for the industry on a couple of levels.

NEW YORK Today’s novel H1N1 news scare may very well turn out to be a “boy who cried SARS” scenario, in which all the news hype drives frenzied concern through the American consciousness but never culminates into a sharp rise in demand of products — antivirals, N-95 facemasks, hand sanitizers — potentially leaving suppliers and retailers with more inventory than they know what to do with.

NEW YORK It’s simply not good enough to stock a company’s “better mousetrap” on a store shelf, especially in a commodity category like multivitamins, and expect that product to move off the shelf with any degree of regularity. There is a need to develop an emotional relationship with the consumer — a relationship that creates a more loyal shopper with a greater investment in the brand.

NEW YORK There are a couple of items of note with Ross’ announcement. First is the value of the pharmacist. A Kaiser Family Foundation poll released last week found that almost half of Americans are putting off healthcare costs, with 33% of Americans reporting that they’re replacing a possible doctor’s office visit with a trip to the pharmacy to purchase an over-the-counter solution.

NEW YORK Prevention — thankfully — has become a buzz word in all the talk about health reform, and it is clear that any meaningful legislation will likely include an enhanced focus on preventative care, wellness and early stage intervention. The long-term effect: better health outcomes and lower costs.

NEW YORK First, the research only underscored what’s happening in America today — more and more Americans are turning toward self-care remedies as a way to curtail escalating healthcare costs. A June poll of consumers released by the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation found that 55% of Americans were putting off health care because of costs; and 37% of all Americans (not just those 55%) are defraying healthcare costs by buying more over-the-counter and natural health solutions.

NEW YORK That connection between healthy foods and pharmacy is the most powerful card a supermarket pharmacy retailer can play in the battle for prescription-drug marketshare.

NEW YORK After decades of fruitless efforts, activist lawmakers in a Democratically controlled Congress finally may be on the verge of pushing through one of the most elusive policy goals of the past half-century: a massive reform of the U.S. healthcare system that aims to extend health coverage to most Americans and put a clamp on federal healthcare spending.

NEW YORK Sales of liquid Tylenol formulations, both adult and children, totaled $104.5 million across food, drug and mass (minus Walmart) for the 52 weeks ended May 17, according to Information Resources Inc. Internal analgesics tablet sales of Tylenol SKUs (across the top 20 brands) generated another $480.9 million. That’s more than $500 million in annual revenue, not including Walmart, potentially impacted by a future Food and Drug Administration decision. That’s not even representative of all acetaminophen sales.

NEW YORK The pending retirement of Kevin Tripp as EVP and president of Supervalu’s Retail Midwest region marks a big changing of the guard for one of chain pharmacy’s biggest players. Still unclear is if whether it also signals an exit from the retail pharmacy industry of this well-known and respected executive.

NEW YORK While the impetus for this multiple advisory committee meeting and the Food and Drug Administration’s working group that first examined this issue had been in the works long before the Obama administration took office — and consequently the new FDA took hold — there has been some concern that an overly zealous agency is placing any shred of safety concern ahead of consumer access — no matter how miniscule that safety risk may be.

NEW YORK First, it’s the first truly “new” product to enter the smoking cessation space in quite some time, featuring a strong point-of-differentiation (convenience packaging; faster efficacy), versus products already in this space.