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TIME: Almanac 1990
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1990 Time Magazine Compact Almanac, The (1991)(Time).iso
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021389
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02138900.008
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1990-09-17
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MEDICINE, Page 65Help on the WayAn AIDS drug is approved
The Food and Drug Administration announced last October that
it would allow promising but unproven treatments for AIDS to move
onto the market more swiftly than other new drugs. Last week the
agency made good on that promise. It said it would approve an
aerosol drug, pentamidine, for treatment of a deadly form of
pneumonia that is a leading killer of AIDS patients.
The move is a major departure from the FDA's traditional
practice of requiring rigorous tests, which can take up to seven
years, to establish a drug's safety and effectiveness before
granting approval. Black-market versions of the aerosol pentamidine
have circulated for years, but the treatment has been studied in
controlled clinical tests only since July 1987. The change of
policy came after organized protests by AIDS patients, who argued
that the Government's stringent regulations were blocking access
to potentially lifesaving medicines.