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Two studies released at the American College of Cardiology suggest that older generics are at least as effective as newer drugs for most patients-and a lot cheaper. One study, of patients who took Vytorin, found that while the two drugs in combination helped reduce cholesterol and other risk factors for heart disease, the combination did not actually do any better than older generics at preventing heart disease. Writing in the New England Journal of Medicine, said that the drugs-which have generated $5 billion in sales in the past few years-should be used as a treatment of last resort.

A second study found that ACE Inhibitors, an older class of drugs used to treat high blood pressure, was as effective as newer ARB drugs at preventing heart attacks and other complications due to high blood pressure. The study, which tracked 17,000 patients over 56 months, found that patients taking the ACE inhibitors did just as well as patients taking ARBs in terms of medical outcomes-at a cost savings of about 20 percent per pill.