covid-19 Archives - Page 37 of 113 - Medical Design Sourcing

CureVac aims to rebound after announcing disappointing COVID-19 results

Some two week after announcing that its COVID-19 vaccine had an interim efficacy of 47% in a Phase 2b/3 trial, CureVac (NSDQ:CVAC) appears to be regaining its footing.

While its stock is trading well below its Feb. 5 peak of $120.43, CVAC shares have risen 30% in the past five days to $75.95 in mid-day trading today.

The company is installing a new chief operating officer, Dr. Malte Greune, who will begin work on July 1, 2021.

Greune will work to bolster CureVac’s board and clinical and manufacturing capabilities.

Greune joins CureVac from Sanofi where he worked in an executive business development role. Gruene has held various leadership positions at pharma companies in the past decade.

Earlier this month, CureVac cofounder Ingmar Hoerr withdrew his candidacy for nomination to the company’s board. Hoerr also served as the company’s CEO from March to August 2020

CureVac has also charged another co-founder, Florian von der…

PharmaJet begins enrollment for needle-free COVID-19 vaccine trial

PharmaJet announced today that it began enrollment for a Phase 1 clinical trial for its needle-free COVID-19 vaccine in Australia.

Golden, Colo.-based PharmaJet’s needle-free injection systems will be studied with Covigen, a DNA-based vaccine developed by French-Thai pharmaceutical company BioNet-Asia in collaboration with Melbourne, Australia-based Technovalia.

Get the full story at our sister site, Drug Delivery Business News.

Moderna’s COVID-19 vaccine holds its own against Delta variant in study

A small study indicated that Moderna’s messenger RNA COVID-19 vaccine was effective against the Delta variant.

Using serum samples from eight Phase 1 participants drawn one week after administering the second dose of the vaccine, the analysis found a 2.1-fold reduction in neutralizing titers against the Delta (B.1.617.2) variant relative to the ancestral strain of the virus.

The World Health Organization has urged the public — including the fully vaccinated — to continue wearing masks and practice social distancing to reduce the spread of the Delta variant.

In related news, Moderna’s COVID-19 also won emergency use authorization in India, where scientists first identified the Delta variant.

The variant is gaining traction in the U.S. and will likely gain dominance in the coming weeks.

The vaccine appears to also offer protection against the Beta (B.1.351), Gamma (P.1), Kappa (B.1.617.1) and Eta (B.1.525) variants, although the reduction in…

Pfizer-AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine combinations are effective, study suggests

Doses of the COVID-19 vaccine at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, Bethesda, Md. DoD photo by Lisa Ferdinando.

British researchers report that using distinct COVID-19 vaccine types for the first and second doses appears to be effective, according to a preprint study in The Lancet.

As global health authorities seek to vaccinate as many people as possible, a potential hurdle is the need to use identical vaccines for the prime and boost stages. Using a so-called heterologous prime-boost vaccination would enable more rapid vaccination, but data about the efficacy of such a strategy have been scarce.

In the recent study, researchers randomized 830 adults 50 and older into eight groups to receive the varying combinations of the AstraZeneca and BioNTech-Pfizer vaccines.

To get a sense of the efficacy of the various combinations, the researchers used a geometric mean ratio (GMR) and geometr…

Sanofi to spend nearly half a billion dollars a year on mRNA vaccine research

Sanofi (NYSE:SNY) announced today that it plans to invest approximately $476.3 million (€400 million) per year on mRNA vaccine development.

Paris-based Sanofi’s intends for its annual investment to go toward a first-of-its-kind vaccine “mRNA Center of Excellence” to accelerate the development and delivery of next-generation vaccines.

Get the full story at our sister site, Drug Discovery & Development.

Sanofi to spend nearly half a billion dollars a year on mRNA vaccine research

Sanofi (NYSE:SNY) announced today that it plans to invest approximately $476.3 million (€400 million) per year on mRNA vaccine development.

Paris-based Sanofi’s intends for its annual investment to go toward a first-of-its-kind vaccines “mRNA Center of Excellence,” where work will be conducted to accelerate the development and delivery of next-generation vaccines.

Approximately 400 employees will integrate end-to-end mRNA vaccine capabilities with dedicated R&D, digital and chemistry, manufacturing and controls (CMC) teams at sites in Cambridge, Mass., and Marcy l’Etoile, Lyon, France, according to a news release. The center will seek to accelerate the mRNA portfolio developed by Sanofi in collaboration with Translate Bio, the company said.

“During the COVID-19 pandemic, mRNA technologies demonstrated potential to deliver new vaccines faster than ever before,” Sanofi Pasteur global head of R&D Jean-Francois Toussaint…

The pandemic and cumulative disease burden are ‘existential’ threats, experts argue

Image courtesy of Pixabay

While the pandemic has highlighted the prowess of the pharmaceutical industry, it should also “serve as a major wake-up call,” said Dr. George Yancopoulos, co-founder, president and CSO of Regeneron (NSDQ:REGN), at a panel at the virtual USA India Chamber of Commerce meeting. COVID-19 has underscored the importance of preparing for infectious pandemics and addressing the burden of all diseases, Yancopoulos added.

Society needs new strategies for addressing the disease burden. “By the year 2050, there will be 10 to 20 million Americans with Alzheimer’s disease with no treatment,” Yancopoulos said. While Biogen’s (NSDQ:BIIB) recently-approved aducanumab could be the first disease-modifying therapy, it remains unclear if the drug is effective.

Added to the disease burden are growing rates of obesity, diabetes, cancer and heart disease — “not to mention the potential of seeing th…

Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna vaccines appear to have a durable immune response

[Photo by Daniel Schludi on Unsplash]A new study shows that the Pfizer and Moderna COVID-19 vaccines create an immune response that may protect recipients for years.

The study, published in Nature, revealed that those who received the two-dose mRNA vaccines developed by Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna could provide immunity for years or even a lifetime in those who were infected with COVID-19 and vaccinated later. However, it remains unclear if vaccination alone has the same long-lasting effect for those who were not infected with the virus beforehand.

Get the full story at our sister site, Drug Discovery & Development.

Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna vaccines appear to have a durable immune response

[Photo by Daniel Schludi on Unsplash]

A new study shows that the Pfizer and Moderna COVID-19 vaccines create an immune response that may protect recipients for years.

The study, published in Nature, revealed that those who received the two-dose mRNA vaccines developed by Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna could provide immunity for years or even a lifetime in those who were infected with COVID-19 and vaccinated later. However, it remains unclear if vaccination alone has the same long-lasting effect for those who were not infected with the virus beforehand.

Washington University (St. Louis) immunologist Dr. Ali Ellebedy and colleagues conducted the study, finding that those who survived COVID-19 retained immune cells that recognized the virus in the bone marrow for at least eight months. Another team’s study showed that those “memory B cells” continue to mature and get stronger for at least o…

Abbott wins CE mark to sell Panbio COVID-19 antigen test over the counter

Abbott (NYSE:ABT) announced today that it received CE mark approval to market the Panbio COVID-19 test for over-the-counter use.

European approval covers direct-to-consumer sale of the Panbio COVID-19 antigen self-test for detecting the SARS-CoV-2 virus in adults and children both with or without symptoms.

Abbott Park, Ill.-based Abbott’s Panbio antigen self-test uses a minimally invasive nasal swab for self-collection of specimens and can be used with infants with the support of an adult, according to a news release.

The easy-to-use test delivers results in 15 minutes, Abbott said, and has already been approved in Europe for asymptomatic people and self-collection under healthcare worker supervision dating back to January.

“We need to remain vigilant in identifying and slowing the spread of the virus to be successful in winning the fight against COVID-19 even as vaccines roll out,” Abbott EVP of rapid & molecular diagnostics…

MedTech 100 roundup: Nearing new highs once again

Having hit a downturn as the summer neared, the medtech industry is now consistently on the rise as June comes to a close.

MassDevice‘s MedTech 100 Index — which includes stocks of the world’s largest medical device companies — finished the week (June 25) at 113.42 points, producing a 2.5% rise from the 110.64-point mark set one week prior (June 18). In all, the industry has risen 5.9% over the past three weeks.

The recent upswing shows no signs of slowing after the industry’s progress came to a halt with a -1.4% dip earlier this month. The index looks set to close in on the 114.58-point mark set in April, marking the industry’s all-time best performance.

Even with some recent setbacks, medtech’s performance continues to reflect an overall rebound from the struggles brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic, too. The industry has registered a 22.9% rise from the pre-pandemic high of 92.32 (set on Feb. 19, 2020), plus a 82.6% increase from the mid-pandemic low …

HHS halts distribution of Lilly’s bamlanivimab/etesevimab antibody cocktail

U.S. government authorities have decided to immediately pause the distribution of Eli Lilly’s bamlanivimab and etesevimab over concerns that the monoclonal antibody cocktail is ineffective against some SARS-CoV-2 variants.

CDC recently concluded that the Gamma variant (P.1) and the Beta variant (B.1.351) make up 11% of COVID-19 infections. They are also continuing to become more dominant, as is the Delta variant (B.1.617.2). CDC has determined that the Delta variant is possibly less responsive to some monoclonal antibody treatments.

The Beta and Gamma variants are significantly less responsive to bamlanivimab and etesevimab than other viral lineages.

Bamlanivimab and etesevimab image courtesy of Lilly.

FDA is recommending Regeneron’s REGEN-COV and GSK’s sotrovimab as more robust antibody therapies.

In related news, FDA recently granted emergency use authorization to tocilizumab, a monoc…