Omnix Medical Ltd. is gearing up for a phase II trial next year of its novel peptide-based antibiotic OMN-6, the lead compound in a pipeline inspired by the antimicrobial strategies of insects.
Venatorx Pharmaceuticals Inc. on Aug. 15 said the U.S. FDA accepted its NDA for an intravenous antibiotic combination, cefepime-taniborbactam, to treat complicated urinary tract infection (cUTI), including acute pyelonephritis.
A chance discovery has led to a new class of antibiotics with multiple arms that interacted with the cell wall of gram-positive bacteria, inhibiting their assembly and disarming them. “It was an accidental discovery. We were using it to stain cells. We also were running evaluations of antibiotics. One of my former students came to me and said: ‘I think we have discovered something that is quite potent as an antibiotic,’” the senior author Xingyu Jiang told BioWorld.
As it nears the end of its cash runway and its lead antibiotic, Nuzyra, approaches a phase IIb readout, Paratek Pharmaceuticals Inc. agreed to be acquired by Gurnet Point Capital and Novo Holdings A/S for up to $3 per share in a deal that will take the company private.
A week ahead of its May 29 PDUFA date, the U.S. FDA has approved Xacduro (sulbactam for injection; durlobactam for injection) for treating one of the toughest and most deadly infections, carbapenem-resistant Acinetobacter baumannii, in adults.
The Memed BV test, developed by Memed Diagnostics Ltd. to distinguish between bacterial and viral infections, offers an accurate diagnosis of the infection in children, and reduces the unnecessary prescription of antibiotics by physicians, according to a study published in the journal, PLOS One.
Researchers from Shandong Academy of Agricultural Science reported the discovery of novel pleuromutilin derivatives as potential antibiotic agents. Synthesis and optimization of a series of pyridinium cation-substituted pleuromutilin analogues led to the identification of compound [I] as the lead candidate with potent antibacterial activity.
Despite the new Medicare inflation rebate, the U.S. price of 27 Part B drugs grew faster than inflation in the last quarter of 2022, triggering the new rebate provision in the Inflation Reduction Act. The manufacturers of those single-source drugs will be billed for the rebates in 2025, but Medicare beneficiaries should see a drop in their coinsurance for those drugs, for the next quarter at least. According to the Biden administration, the decrease in out-of-pocket costs for those drugs will range from $2 to as much as $390 per average dose from April 1 through June 30.
The stage is set for a showdown between the pharma industry and national governments and public health experts over which policy the EU should grasp, as it bids to create a pan-European incentive scheme that will encourage innovation and get more antibiotics through to market. At issue is a proposal supported by the industry, under which companies getting approval for a new antibiotic would be given a voucher allowing them to extend market exclusivity of any different drug of their choice for one year.
Low enrollment in a phase III trial and a missed primary endpoint sent Aridis Pharmaceuticals Inc.’s shares tumbling by 35% on Jan. 26, although the company’s AR-301 (tosatoxumab) showed superior efficacy over the control group in Staphylococcus aureus ventilator-associated pneumonia (VAP) patients.
