Johnson & Johnson said this morning that its second quarter earnings fell 3.6% compared to the year-earlier period. The stock was up a bit in the first few hours of trading. For more on the numbers, see the earnings story from Dow Jones Newswires. The Health Blog listened in on the company’s conference call, and we were struck by a few comments from CFO Dominic Caruso: J&J “strongly” disagrees with an FDA advisory panel’s recent call for new limits on the sale of acetaminophen, the active ingredient in J&J’s Tylenol. The company has given its own recommendations to the FDA, which must make a final decision on what to do. “This will take some time to sort out,” Caruso said. He said that Tylenol for adults notches about $1 billion in yearly sales. It’s too early to say whether medical device makers will have to follow in

the footsteps of the drug industry and agree to contribute to financing a health-care overhaul. But a recent $155 billion deal by hospitals is likely to impact the medical device companies. Caruso expects hospitals will put pressure on medical device prices in order to obtain the savings. “We would expect medical device manufacturers would be contributing to that indirectly,” he said. Despite the mixed trial results for potential Alzheimer’s treatment bapineuzumab, and concerns that at least one researcher expressed to the WSJ about its viability, J&J’s due diligence found lots of promise in the experimental drug as well as in other Alzheimer’s therapies under development. Last month J&J agree to buy a stake in Elan Corp. and its Alzheimer’s drug development program, which includes bapineuzumab. Photo: Associated Press

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In Earnings Call, J&J Defends Tylenol, Talks Up Elan Deal