Baxter to cut up to 4,000 more jobs Will reduce price of new drug as profit falls almost 18%

Baxter International said Thursday it will slash up to 4,000 morejobs to cut costs and reduce the price of its key new drug Advate toboost sales as it announced that first-quarter net earnings droppednearly 18 percent.

The world's No. 1 maker of blood treatment products also announcedplans to close additional plasma collection centers and reduce plasmaproduction by 13 percent.

The job cuts will represent 7 to 8 percent of Baxter's 50,000-employee global work force and will include cuts in northernIllinois. Baxter employs about 4,500 people in northern Illinois,including 1,000 people at its headquarters in Deerfield. Roughly halfof all the reductions will be made in …