Pluristem Therapeutics Inc., an Israeli regenerative medicine company, said several of the seven COVID-19 patients treated with its allogeneic placental expanded (PLX) cells have progressed from suffering severe symptoms of the disease to signs of clinical recovery, including respiratory improvements.
“In any crisis, leaders have two equally important responsibilities: solve the immediate problem and keep it from happening again... The first point is more pressing, but the second has crucial long-term consequences.” So wrote Bill Gates in a February editorial in The New England Journal of Medicine about COVID-19, which “has started behaving a lot like the once-in-a-century pathogen we’ve been worried about.”
Evercore ISI assembled a dozen internal specialists for a webinar to talk about COVID-19 from a variety of perspectives, with opinions aplenty on transmission route, up-and-coming treatment prospects, and problems in how testing procedures are understood – or not.
As the demand increases for ventilators to treat Americans with severe symptoms of COVID-19, another shortage is being exacerbated – a shortage of the drugs needed to treat patients on ventilators.
LONDON – COVID-19 is posing a real threat to the viability of medical charities in the U.K., which collectively fund 17,000 scientists and invest more than £1.3 billion (US$1.6 billion) per annum in research.
With nearly a quarter of the activity announced in March focused on COVID-19, the first quarter of 2020 appears to be on target to beat the deal and M&A values of two of the last three years, although it remains behind 2019. Despite the uncertainty of the coronavirus pandemic, let alone the upcoming U.S. presidential election, the industry has fared relatively well in terms of dealmaking so far this year, even as the markets have plummeted and partnering events have moved to a virtual format. In fact, deals should logically increase as the pandemic takes its toll on the economy, according to a biopharma executive who responded to a recent J.P. Morgan survey.
LONDON – Izana Bioscience Ltd. has become the third company to supply an anti-GM-CSF antibody for compassionate use against COVID-19, announcing namilumab, currently in phase IIb testing in the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis and ankylosing spondylitis, will be used to treat 20 patients with severe respiratory symptoms.
HONG KONG – Another promising candidate has emerged in the race to find a treatment for the COVID-19 coronavirus. San Diego-based Ansun Biopharma Inc. released positive results from a four-patient study of its DAS-181 candidate, which is being developed for the treatment of severe COVID-19 infection.
Given the evolving COVID-19 situation, U.S. House committee chairs are asking the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to direct federal agencies to immediately extend all public comment periods by at least 45 days beyond the end of the declared national emergency, whenever that may be.
COVID-19 has disrupted science in the way it has disrupted everything else. In the short term, universities have largely closed shop as a way to maximize social distancing, and lots of science – or at least, lots of bench work – is not getting done.
