Med-tech happenings, including deals and partnerships, grants, preclinical data and other news in brief: 1health.io, Arc Bio, Genesprint Group, Holo Surgical, IMEC, Infrawear, Remote Medical International, Royal Philips, Suralign Holdings, TÜV Rheinland.
With the lack of public trust and confidence the biggest barrier to SARS-CoV-2 vaccines in the U.S., the risk of granting an emergency use authorization to a vaccine with safety issues or questionable efficacy could destroy confidence in future FDA-approved products. That message was drummed home throughout the Oct. 22 meeting of the FDA’s Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee.
The U.S. FDA’s recent decision to pass on any emergency use authorization (EUA) filings for tests for the COVID-19 pandemic is well known, but the agency had a chance to lend some additional information on that question in the Oct. 21 town hall. Despite the opportunity to clarify some of the underlying questions, Tim Stenzel, director of the Office of In Vitro Diagnostics and Radiological Health (OIR), said little more than that the change was made “largely because the FDA cannot require an EUA, according to the HHS statement.”
DUBLIN – The Lancet Infectious Diseases has published the first clinical data on BBIBP-CorV, an inactivated whole virus vaccine directed against SARS-CoV-2. The early stage phase I/II study tested the Chinese-developed vaccine in 540 healthy volunteers, including 96 older participants.
LONDON – The world’s first COVID-19 human challenge trial is due to start in London next year, after the government announced £33.6 million (US$43.5 million) funding for the project.
The U.S. FDA’s device center has declared it will not review emergency use authorization (EUA) requests for lab-developed tests (LDTs) for the COVID-19 pandemic, but on the agency’s most recent town hall, on Oct. 14, FDA officials were uncertain as to whether labs should file those EUAs, leaving labs in a state of limbo yet again.
Regulatory snapshots, including global submissions and approvals, clinical trial approvals and other regulatory decisions and designations: Clinical Enterprise, Ezra, Spectrum Solutions.
LONDON - The world’s first COVID-19 human challenge trial is due to start in London next year, after the government announced £33.6 million (US$42.5 million) funding for the project. In the initial phase, the aim is to establish the dose of SARS-CoV-2 needed to cause infection and to characterize the immune response to virus. That will lead on to tests of individual COVID-19 vaccines, in which volunteers will be challenged with the effective dose of SARS-CoV-2 one month after inoculation.
CAJICA, Colombia – The Russian vaccine candidate Sputnik V, developed by Moscow’s Gamaleya National Research Institute of Epidemiology and Microbiology to prevent the SARS-CoV-2 virus that causes COVID-19, is undergoing phase III trials in Venezuela under complete secrecy.
