Medical device makers slip in sympathy with J&J's MedTech miss

** Shares of major medical device makers fall in sympathy after Johnson & Johnson JNJ.N reported lower-than-expected Q3 sales in its MedTech unit, with sales outside the US nearly flat

** Abbott Laboratories ABT.N, Boston Scientific BSX.N, Medtronic MDT.N, Intuitive Surgical ISRG.O, Stryker SYK.N, and Zimmer Biomet ZBH.N are down between 1% and 4%

** J&J shares fall 4.7% to $251.33 after MedTech sales rise 2.5% to $8.6 bln, trailing analysts' est of $8.71 bln - LSEG-compiled data

** J&J CFO Joe Wolk says the Middle East conflict, austerity measures in Europe and pricing in China weighed on international results "but maybe in a little bit more pronounced way"

** "The primary point of investor concern remains the underwhelming MedTech performance (notably ex-US), which management (JNJ) acknowledged on the call" - RBC Capital Markets

** "We wouldn’t be surprised to see VBP headwinds in Surgical impact Medtronic, and perhaps Intuitive as well," J.P.Morgan analysts say, referring to China's volume-based procurement pricing program

** J.P.Morgan added, however, that it is "hard to generalize J&J’s results to the rest of the sector"