Pfizer/Trovan trial in Nigeria adjourned

The long-running $2.75 billion civil suit in Nigeria's Kano State, alleging that clinical trials by US drug giant Pfizer had led to the deaths of hundreds of local children (Marketletters passim) resumed on October 6, but was then - once again - adjourned three days later, to November 6. Pfizer is accused of conducting an improper clinical study of Trovan (trovafloxacin mesylate) in Nigeria in 1996, during a meningitis outbreak. The firm denies claims that it failed to properly register the trial and refutes the charge that it put children at risk.