Drugs giant AstraZeneca is axeing 250 UK jobs as part of a plan to shed 1400 worldwide.

The cuts follow hundreds of job losses from rival pharmaceuticals businesses including GlaxoSmithKline, which last week said it was closing its Dartford hub with 620 redundancies.

Astra is moving production from its Macclesfield plant - which will concentrate more on newer drugs - to China. It will also shut three sites on the Continent.

The drugs industry is in the middle of a dramatic shift in its global structure as it copes with declining sales growth in the West and rising demand in emerging markets. Astra has already cut more than 1000 British jobs since launching a programme last year to shed 7600 worldwide. Today's 1400 is on top of those cuts.

The drugs industry expects recession-bound Western governments to slow health-service spending.

Astra today said it had won a temporary court order blocking a copycat version of key asthma drug Pulmicort. Competition from generic versions of drugs coming off patent has been another factor forcing drugmakers to shrink their operations