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Alimta™ Expanded Access Program

April 26, 2004

Senate Considers Asbestos Victims' Fund (Yahoo! News story) You can contact your congressional representatives to express your opinion on asbestos legislation through the Contact Congress page on ALCASE's website.

June 27, 2003

Senate Panel Agrees to Increase Size of Asbestos Trust (New York Times)

Senate Panel Postpones Final Asbestos Bill Vote (Reuters)

March 31, 2003

U.S. Steel Loses Asbestos Lawsuit (LA Times article)

January, 2003

No link found between polio vaccine and mesothelioma (Medscape 1/6/03)

December, 2002

Grants Announced by Mesothelioma Applied Research Foundation. (U.S. Newswire 12/13/02)

Asbestos claims settlement announced by Halliburton Co. (Washington Post 12/19/02)

July, 2002

Cancer Care Teleconference about mesothelioma was held July 31. Listen to the recorded discussion.

Presenter was Richard Gralla, M.D., Professor of Medicine and medical oncologist at Columbia University, New York, NY.

May, 2002

Drug Helps Treat Asbestos-Related Lung Cancer

An experimental drug is the first treatment shown to be effective against a form of lung cancer that is related to asbestos exposure, researchers report. The cancer, called mesothelioma, causes severe, throbbing chest pain--"the really devastating aspect of this disease that just haunts people"--and doctors have had no way to treat it, said study author Dr. Nicholas Vogelzang, director of the University of Chicago Cancer Research Center.

Patients generally live about 6 to 9 months after diagnosis. But the new drug, Alimta (pemetrexed), was shown to add an average of 3 months to patients' lives, Vogelzang said here Monday at a meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO). "We now have a treatment that not only treats this disease but also improves symptoms," he said. "This is the first time we've ever documented an improvement in mesothelioma survival." Other experts also were enthusiastic.