Remember when it was really uncommon to find the Food and Drug Administration disregarding the advice of its outside experts? For instance, Dendreon's
Fools, those days are over.
Johnson & Johnson
Johnson & Johnson's antibiotic joins Schering-Plough's
Doribax's rejection probably shouldn't have come as a huge surprise. The panel just barely recommended approval -- voting eight to five that it was safe and seven to six that it was effective. Also, the FDA has increasingly scrutinized antibiotics in the last few months, with Wyeth
The take-home message for investors is that you can no longer count on the headline "FDA Advisory Panel Recommends Approval of Your Favorite Drug" to guide your investment decisions. Investors need to dig a little deeper by reading the FDA's advisory-panel briefing documents to get better insight into what the agency is thinking. And even then, don't count on it.