Reuters Health News Summary

Following is a summary of current health news briefs. With self-compression, women suffer less and mammogram quality not at all

There are many reasons women dislike mammograms, chief among them the awkward and often painful process of having their breasts squashed by a technician into a machine that flattens them for the images. But a trial in France suggests that breast cancer screening might be just as effective and less unpleasant when women can control the compression device themselves. Breakfast may not help keep pounds off

The idea that skipping breakfast contributes to weight gain doesn't mean that eating breakfast can help with weight loss, a research review suggests. Researchers examined data from 13 studies in which some participants ate breakfast and others skipped it. The people who ate breakfast consumed more calories and weighed more than individuals who skipped this morning meal, a research review suggests. Swine fever spreads in Japan, 15,000 pigs to be culled

Japan's swine fever outbreak has spread to five prefectures including Osaka, and more than 10,000 pigs will be culled as part of measures to prevent further contagion, the government said on Wednesday. This is a different strain from the deadly African swine fever China has been battling, an agriculture ministry official said. Bipartisan group of lawmakers introduces bill to fight high drug prices

A bipartisan group of U.S. senators re-introduced a bill on Tuesday aimed at helping generic drug companies bring out a cheaper version of pharmaceuticals. Makers of branded drugs have long been accused of refusing to provide samples of drugs on a government list of restricted medicines. Without the samples, generic competitors cannot prove their medicines are as safe and effective as the more expensive versions. Exclusive: Facing crackdown in Canada, drugmakers offered billions in price cuts

Canadian pharmaceutical industry lobby groups, in an effort to head off a planned crackdown on prescription drug prices, offered to give up C$8.6 billion ($6.6 billion) in revenue over 10 years, freeze prices or reduce the cost of treating rare diseases, according to interviews and documents seen by Reuters. Those industry offers did not impress federal officials, coming last year as Canada prepared to expand the powers of a little-known federal watchdog called the Patented Medicine Prices Review Board (PMPRB) to reduce the cost of prescription drugs. U.S. jury orders Takeda to pay Bayer $155 million over hemophilia drug

A U.S. jury has ordered Takeda Pharmaceutical Co's Baxalta unit to pay Bayer AG $155.19 million for infringing a patent related to a Baxalta hemophilia treatment, court records made public on Tuesday show. Jurors in the federal court in Wilmington, Delaware, reached their verdict on the seventh day of a trial after rejecting Baxalta's argument that the June 2016 patent on the treatment, Adynovate, was invalid. Merck CEO Frazier to testify at Senate drug pricing hearing

U.S. drugmaker Merck & Co Inc said on Tuesday that its Chief Executive Ken Frazier plans to testify at a Senate hearing later this month examining rising prescription drug prices. Republican Senator Chuck Grassley, chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, and Democratic Senator Ron Wyden, ranking member of the committee, on Monday invited executives from seven pharmaceutical companies, including Merck, to testify. The others are AbbVie Inc, AstraZeneca Plc , Bristol-Myers Squibb Co, Johnson & Johnson, Pfizer Inc and Sanofi SA. Roche adapts newer breast cancer drug in face of Herceptin imitations

Swiss drugmaker Roche aims to broaden the use of its Kadcyla breast cancer treatment as rivals crowd into the market with biosimilar copies of its older mainstay Herceptin. Roche said on Tuesday it had applied for U.S. Food and Drug Administration approval for Kadcyla, a five-year-old drug, for post-surgical use in women with a form of early stage breast cancer who still show signs of disease after treatment with Herceptin and chemotherapy. Roche, joining rivals, donates hemophilia drug to boost access

Switzerland's Roche will donate its new hemophilia A drug Hemlibra to a World Hemophilia Federation program, it said on Wednesday, joining rivals who also back the effort to help patients in developing countries who face treatment hurdles. Roche's donation will focus on patients who have developed resistance, or inhibitors, to current hemophilia A treatments as well as children, the Basel-based company said in a statement. WHO and vaccine group back 'critical' cervical cancer shots

A vaccine given to girls to protect them against a virus that causes cervical cancer is a "critical" health tool and access to it should be scaled up as swiftly as possible, especially in poorer countries, cancer experts said on Monday. Figures from the World Health Organization's International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) showed an estimated 570,000 new cases of cervical cancer were diagnosed worldwide in 2018, making it the fourth most common cancer in women globally.