The 39th Annual J.P. Morgan Healthcare Conference was sans Celgene Corp.'s annual tradition of kicking off the conference with preliminary revenue and earnings from the previous year, but plenty of other companies stepped up and offered preliminary results of their own. Unfortunately, some companies continued to face headwinds selling drugs during the pandemic as patients avoided their doctors' offices.
Gilead Sciences Inc.’s move to grab Myr GmbH for about €1.15 billion (US$1.39 billion) in cash up front, with €300 million if the latter’s Hepcludex (bulevirtide) wins FDA clearance, put chronic hepatitis delta virus (HDV) in the headlines and benefited the stock of another player in the space: Eiger Biopharmaceuticals Inc. (NASDAQ:EIGR), which closed at $10.27, up $1.51, or 17%.
It’s official. After a weekend of rumors and speculation, President-elect Joe Biden formally announced the nomination of California Attorney General Xavier Becerra Dec. 7 as secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, along with Vivek Murthy as surgeon general.
Citing a lack of evidence that it improves survival, the need for ventilation or time to clinical improvement, the World Health Organization (WHO) has advised doctors against using Gilead Sciences Inc.’s antiviral Veklury (remdesivir) to treat COVID-19.
According to an analysis conducted by BioWorld of the third-quarter 2020 financial reports filed by public biopharmaceutical companies with market caps greater than $1 billion, and excluding big pharma companies, the amount that was invested in research and development (R&D) during the nine-month period increased by almost 21% compared to the same period last year. The spending was bolstered by companies turning their attention to focus their research on therapies and vaccines to tackle COVID-19.
It didn’t take long for a U.S. district judge to grant Gilead Sciences Inc.’s request for a temporary restraining order to stop two interconnected health care networks in Florida from defrauding the company’s Advancing Access Medication Assistance Program that provides free HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis drugs to eligible, uninsured people.
The dramatic increase in COVID-19 infections in Europe and the U.S., combined with information overload surrounding the lead up to the Nov. 3 contentious U.S. presidential election, was more than enough to send investors to the sidelines in October.
DUBLIN – The global product development pipeline for COVID-19 is now twice as big as for any particular cancer indication, a major disease like Alzheimer’s or any other infectious disease indication.
