Controlling MS: Drugs taken orally to control multiple sclerosis are beginning to hit the market, starting with Novartis’s Gilenya, but while they’re attractive to patients, the price is high and the extent of side effects unknown, the WSJ reports . Gilenya costs about $48,000 a year, compared to about $40,000 for currently available injectable drugs. More oral drugs, from Biogen Idec, Teva and Sanofi, could be on the market in 2012 assuming positive data and FDA approval, the paper says. TB Breakthrough: A large study funded by the CDC finds that a three-month tuberculosis-treatment regimen using two drugs taken weekly works as well as a longer regimen with daily pills, the Washington Post reports . The shorter regimen, at $503, is more than twice as expensive as the longer one, but adherence rates were higher. Luck of the Draw?: Two of the

three judges on an appeals-court panel that will hear a challenge to the health-care overhaul law on June 1 were appointed by Republican presidents, the WSJ reports . Judges were chosen at random. Last week a randomly selected panel of three judges — all chosen by Democratic presidents — hearing another challenge to the law seemed sympathetic to the Obama administration’s arguments. Missing Knowledge: Experts warn that low autopsy rates may be hampering our understanding of certain diseases and treatments, Kaiser Health News reports . Rates have fallen to about 5% from about 50% in the 1960s, and about 40% of hospitals don’t do autopsies at all, KHN says. And a small number of hospitals charge between $3,500 and $6,000 for the service. Image: iStockphoto

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