ABBOTT SEEKS TO USE NEW DRUG FOR AIDS PATIENTS

Abbott Laboratories contacted the Food and Drug Administration to propose a draft protocol for compassionate use of the new antibiotic, Clarithromycin, in certain AIDS patients. The compassionate-use request would cover AIDS patients suffering from the opportunistic infection known as mycobacterium avium complex, or mac. Abbott thinks new medical data from recently completed U.S. and European clinical studies demonstrate ”that Clarithromycin is useful in the eradication or reduction of mac in immunocompromised patients.”