An Idiot with a Computer Proves Right -- Exubera is GONE.

Scott's Web Log just published the news that in an amazing triumph of common sense over marketing dollars, Pfizer is pulling Exubera off the market.

When Exubera launched, I was quoted in Business Week (complete with horrible photo) as a "typical patient." I said I would not use Exubera because it had some serious problems.

The journalist did not go into what those problems were, though I had spelled them out in some detail, but the main one was that Exubera was a bolus (mealtime) insulin that was supposed to be dosed by the patient's body weight, not by the carbohydrate content of the meal.

That's just plain nuts.

I'm extremely insulin sensitive and dosing Exubera by my body weight would have been likely to send me to the hospital with a severe hypo, as it would have resulted in my taking a dose several times higher than what I actually use. In addition, Exubera was supplied in packs, but a one pack dose was not 1/2 of a 2 pack dose. Titrate that!

Investors did not respond well to my words in Business Week and in the comments section of the Business Week articles I was labeled "an idiot with a computer." I've taken pride in that ever since, and I'm thrilled that the judgment of this idiot with a computer has been vindicated by the medical community who refused to prescribe Exubera despite billions of dollars of money spent on marketing it.

Now if only my warnings on Januvia could get a bit of attention in the media . . . As proud as I am of calling Exubera correctly, this idiot with a computer really doesn't want to be proven right on Januvia by the discovery years from now that it caused hundreds or thousands of unnecessary patient deaths.

BTW, I owe Pfizer this much, that had it not been for the Exubera flap I wouldn't have started this blog. The journalist who interviewed me found me on the diabetes newsgroup, alt.support.diabetes, but described me in print as "a blogger." I figured if I was going to be called a blogger, I better blog, so I did, which has turned out to be a very good decision.