NEW YORK Walgreen Co. said Thursday it will begin selling special envelopes to shoppers to help them dispose of medications they no longer need.

Starting Friday, the drugstore operator said, customers can buy a special envelope at pharmacies for $2.99, and use it to mail in unused or expired prescription or over-the-counter drugs. The envelopes can be dropped into any U.S. Postal Service mailbox, and the contents will be mailed directly to a medical incinerator facility. They will be received by law enforcement officials, and then burned.

Controlled substances such as morphine will be excluded from the program because they cannot legally be sent through the mail.

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SOURCE: Minnesota Health Fairs Inc

  Sep 14, 2010 16:28 ET

MINNEAPOLIS, MN–(Marketwire – September 14, 2010) –  Flu shot season is here and Health Fair 11 is ready to hold its annual Flu Fighter clinics. But before you head out to get your annual vaccination, there are some important changes to know about.

1. Flu Fighter clinics have new host sites. in September, MVNA nurses will be giving flu shots at all Minnesota Life Time Fitness locations. In October, vaccinations will be available at all YMCA centers in the Twin Cities and western Wisconsin. Club memberships are NOT required to attend Flu Fighter clinics.

2. Everyone is currently eligible to get a flu shot.  The Cent

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/ AP

– AP

– AP

– AP

BOSTON Cancer patients, brace yourselves. Many new drug treatments cost nearly $100,000 a year, sparking fresh debate about how much a few months more of life is worth.

The latest is Provenge, a first-of-a-kind therapy approved in April.

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WASHINGTON Scrutiny of drug and consumer product giant Johnson & Johnson ratcheted up Tuesday as a congressional chairman demanded the company provide proof of its claim that federal regulators cleared a plan to secretly buy up defective painkillers.

The letter from Rep. Edolphus “Ed” Towns, D-N.Y., comes a week ahead of a hearing to scrutinize J&J’s “phantom recall,” conducted last year, when the company paid an outside contractor to quietly purchase more than 88,000 packets of Motrin off store shelves.

A J&J executive testified in May that the FDA “was aware” of the action.

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