Merck was the biggest news today with three big stories. Let’s get to it…

• Merck #1: Merck has licensed CDA-1 and CDB-1, monoclonal antibodies for the treatment of C. difficile, from Medarex and Massachusetts Biologic Laboratory (MBL). Medarex and MBL will share an upfront of $60M and up to $165M in milestones from Merck. The organizations say that a Phase 2 trial revealed a statistically significant reduction in infections among 200 patients. Medarex will make an oral presentation of the full data at Digestive Disease Week in June. [FierceBiotech]

• Merck #2: Merck might scrap telcagepant, a late stage investigational drug for migraine after discovering the drug causes liver enzyme elevations. [WSJ Health Blog]

• Merck #3: Merck’s Q1 profit decreased by a spectacular 57!! [BloggingStocks]

• Rejected! The Supreme Court says it will not hear Fen-Phen appeal. [Yahoo!Finance]

• Sanofi-Aventis is investing $90M in Beijing its manufacturing facility to build pre-filled injection production lines for its diabetes treatment Lantus SoloStar. [Medical News TODAY]

• Gilead shatters earnings record, Q1 profit rose 21% on increased demand for its HIV drugs, Truvada and Atripla. [Bloomberg]

• Finally, Par Pharmaceutical and Reliant Pharmaceuticals have settled their Rythmol patent dispute. [Pharmalive]

Image from utexas

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