Pharmaceutical
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Wide Scale Testing Beginning for COVID-19 Vaccines
Read the rest of this entry »Researchers are making so much progress in developing a vaccine against COVID-19 that the first wide-scale testing could begin in a matter of weeks.
The New York Times Coronavirus Vaccine Tracker says a vaccine developed by the 10-year-old biotech company Moderna expects to start wide-scale testing this month. If it does, it would mark an almost unprecedented acceleration of the clinical testing process.
Typically, testing and approving a new vaccine …
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Pandemic Gives Drug Onshoring New Momentum
Read the rest of this entry »The shortage of masks, respirators and other medical supplies that accompanied the rise of COVID-19 cases has added momentum to government efforts to encourage the onshoring of medical manufacturing.
Since the beginning of the year, the US government through the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA) has awarded at least billion dollars to bioscience and contract development and manufacturing organizations to create or expand production capability in the US. …
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Statins Show Promise in Reducing Death from Ovarian Cancer
Read the rest of this entry »Women with ovarian cancer who take statins to lower their cholesterol have a 40% lower death rate.
“These drugs are appealing as they are widely used, inexpensive, and well tolerated in most patients. The associated reduction in ovarian cancer mortality is promising,” said Dr. Kala Visvanathan, lead researcher of a new study presented last week during the American Association for Cancer Research Virtual Annual Meeting II.
Dr. Visvanathan, professor of …
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Pharma Rebrands More Often and Gets Better Results
Read the rest of this entry »When Actavis acquired Forest Labs in 2014 it chose to rebrand the products under its own, better known name. That rebranding decision helped Actavis expand the reach of Forest Labs’ products, especially those in women’s health and gastroenterology.
That example is one of the most successful merger rebrandings in a study from the brand valuation consultancy, Brand Finance.
Researching the results of 3,000 mergers and acquisitions since 2014, Brand …
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Virtual Clinical Trials Could Become the New Normal
Read the rest of this entry »Since Pfizer launched the first randomized clinical trial to be conducted entirely remotely in 2011, virtual clinical trials have been a trend waiting to happen. Now, prompted by the COVID-19 pandemic, and given the blessing of the FDA, broad acceptance of decentralized trials is becoming a reality.
Writing in the May DIA Global Forum, Dr. Jonathan Cotliar, says that with the impact COVID-19 is having on traditional, face-to-face trials, “Those …
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COVID-19 Puts Spotlight On Adaptive Clinical Trials
Read the rest of this entry »One of the lasting effects of the COVID-19 pandemic is likely to be the accelerated acceptance of adaptive clinical trials.
Dr. Anthony Fauci endorsed adaptive trials when he announced the effectiveness of remdesivir in treating COVID-19 patients.
“The data shows that remdesivir has a clear-cut, significant positive effect in diminishing the time to recover," Fauci said in a White House briefing April 29.
The data came from a unique type …
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Spinach May One Day Produce New Drugs
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Almost a century ago the comic strip hero Popeye popularized spinach, attributing his amazing strength to the leafy green. Within a few short years of Popeye’s first appearance in 1929, spinach sales soared.
Now, spinach has a new claim to fame. Biologists are using microscopic parts of the plant to speed up photosynthesis, the process of using light to convert carbon dioxide into energy and oxygen.
Still limited to …
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COVID-19 Is Prompting Innovation In Research Trials
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As scientists race to develop a vaccine and cure for the coronavirus that causes COVID-19, a remarkable collaboration has emerged among pharmaceutical and bioscience firms that in other times compete fiercely with each other.
Promoted by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation weeks before the virus was declared a pandemic, the initial 15 companies -- Novartis, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Eli Lilly and Gilead among them -- began sharing proprietary information about …
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Llamas Could Help Prevent COVID Infections
Read the rest of this entry »Could a cure for COVID-19 come from llamas?
Researchers are guarded in their optimism, but in a paper for the journal Cell, they report using a type of antibody called a nanobody produced by llamas to develop a treatment that prevents the virus from invading human cells.
Scientists have long known that llamas and other camelids not only produce antibodies like those made by humans, but also create a …
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Bioscience Rushing to Develop Virus Vaccines and Treatments
Read the rest of this entry »Big pharma and small bioscience are taking on the coronavirus, some becoming collaborators, some going it alone.
At least 21 companies are working on a vaccine or treatment, according to MarketWatch. A few of the larger firms are financing the development themselves or with partners. The larger share are being funded by the Department of Health and Human Services, and the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID). …
