Trending News Today: Supreme Court Ruling Paves the Way for Biosimilar Growth

A unanimous Supreme Court ruling will speed up biosimilar approvals, according to The Washington Post. The ruling could result in the loss of billions of dollars in sales for drug manufacturers of the reference biologics. On Monday, the court ruled in favor of generic drug maker Sandoz in its dispute with Amgen over the cancer drug Neupogen. A 2010 law allows the generic version of the drugs to be produced after a 12-year exclusivity period for the biologic. Under the new ruling, Justice Clarence Thomas stated that biosimilar drug manufacturers will no longer be required to wait an extra 6 months after receiving FDA approval to sell the drugs, the Post reported.

Obesity continues to be a growing public health crisis. New data further solidifies this notion, finding that 2.2 billion adults and children worldwide have health problems related to obesity and being overweight, reported USA Today. In a study published in the New England Journal of Medicine, investigators found that 30% of the population worldwide have weight problems, with 10% being obese. Among the 20 countries with the largest populations, the United States had the highest level of obesity among children and young adults at nearly 13%. Egypt had the highest percentage of adult obesity at approximately 35%, whereas Bangladesh and Vietnam had the lowest rates at 1% each. Overall, the United States had the highest incidence of obesity, at 79.4 million, followed by China.

Dog owners walk an average of 22 minutes more per day compared with individuals who do not own a dog, a study published in BMC Public Health found. The investigators examined men and women 60 years and older who were either owned a dog or did not. The participants were asked to wear activPAL devices 24 hours a day to measure factors such as speed and distance. The results of the study showed that dog owners walked briskly and got their heart rates up, averaging 22 minutes more of walking per day, NPR reported. Additionally, some patients had a pace of approximately 3 miles per hour at times.