When it comes to healthcare, whether you live in the United States or Uganda, disease is our common enemy. Patients who are managing chronic conditions or fighting deadly illnesses hold out hope for new medicines and improved therapies that can help them. And America's pharmaceutical research companies are working hard to fulfill that hope by discovering thousands of potential new medicines and treatments to fight disease, improve health, and give patients and physicians better treatment options.

In fact, every year, dozens of new medicines and therapies are added to the medical arsenal in the fight against disease. These new medicines are part of the steady stream of medical and therapeutic advances that are revolutionizing and improving healthcare. They are the result of medical research and development that can take as long as 15 years and cost nearly 1 billion dollars to bring a new medicine from the laboratory to a pharmacy shelf.

While they work on these new medicines, America's pharmaceutical research companies are also partnering with health care providers and patient groups to better inform patients about health, disease and treatment options. So when you have questions like, "Are there new drugs to fight cancer?", we want to help you find the answer-because knowledge is the best medicine of all.