LONDON – The U.K. Medicines and Healthcare products Agency (MHRA) has given approval for the first-in-human study of Codagenix Inc.’s COVI-VAC, a live, attenuated whole virus COVID-19 vaccine, which is engineered to be structurally identical to wild-type SARS-CoV-2, but is much slower to replicate.
Med-tech happenings, including deals and partnerships, grants, preclinical data and other news in brief: Activepure Technologies, Aditx Therapeutics, American Bio Medica, Ashvattha Therapeutics, Babylon Health, Builtspace, Diabeloop, Efemoral Medical, Eurofins Technologies, GE Healthcare, Hummingbird Bioscience, Insightec, Lifescan, Luminultra, Mymedbot, Novacyt, Novocure, Oncimmune, Pacific Biosciences, Roche, SonALAsense, Tempus Labs, Todos Medical, Variscite, Welldoc.
Michael Mina, assistant professor of epidemiology at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, again criticized the U.S. FDA for taking a conventional regulatory approach to rapid antigen tests for the pandemic. However, not everyone at the FDA’s parent department deserves brickbats. Mina said Assistant Secretary for Health Brett Giroir deserves a lot of credit for assisting in the effort to stand up pilot studies for rapid antigen tests that could be used to restore the U.S. economy even in the absence of a fully rolled-out vaccination campaign.
Regulatory snapshots, including global submissions and approvals, clinical trial approvals and other regulatory decisions and designations: Applied Biocode.
The latest global regulatory news, changes and updates affecting medical devices and technologies, including: FDA delays comment period for electromagnetic compatibility draft; CMS, ONC post info sharing, prior authorization rule; Van Hollen debuts diagnostic accuracy bill; CDC updates POC testing guidelines; GAO: Specimen biopsy handling errors relatively low.
The U.S. FDA has made it easier for people who want to get tested for COVID-19, granting emergency use authorization (EUA) for direct-to-consumer sales of Laboratory Corp. of America Holdings’ (Labcorp) Pixel COVID-19 test home collection kit. With this latest EUA, any individual 18 years and older can purchase the Pixel test system without a prescription.
The latest U.S. FDA town hall for diagnostics included the usual technical questions about test validation, but there are some frustrations among test developers regarding turn-around times for emergency use authorizations (EUAs). Nonetheless, Tim Stenzel, director of the Office of In Vitro Diagnostics and Radiological Health (OIR) at the FDA, said the surge in staff assigned to review EUA filings has worked to some benefit, claiming that the agency has rendered a decision in connection with 65 applications in the two weeks leading up to the Dec. 9 town hall.
