LONDON – The U.K. treasury announced a £500 million (US$622.5 million) COVID-19 bailout plan for research-based startups, which could see the government holding equity stakes in venture capital-backed firms.

LONDON - The director general of the World Health Organization has given a dignified and measured response to President Donald Trump’s decision to halt U.S. funding of WHO, pending a review of its handling of the coronavirus pandemic.

DUBLIN – The EMA has activated a COVID-19 task force to coordinate and accelerate the European regulatory response to the pandemic. The task force is intended to take a lead role in shaping the development, authorization and post-approval surveillance of drugs and vaccines for treating or preventing COVID-19 infection.

LONDON – An unseemly row has broken out at the heart of EU science, with Mauro Ferrari, head of the European Research Council (ERC), accusing the European Commission of failing to coordinate and fund R&D needed to combat COVID-19.

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.

The five-day Bio-Europe Spring 2020 conference, possibly the first ever life sciences partnering event staged in an all-virtual format, ended on Friday, March 27, with high hopes that the industry would return to face-to-face interactions next year in Barcelona.

Biopharma industry leaders in China who were the first to experience the chaos of the COVID-19 pandemic shared their thoughts during a closing plenary session of the virtual Bio-Europe Spring 2020 meeting.

DUBLIN – Novartis AG, Bristol Myers Squibb Co. and Sanofi SA were among firms that secured positive opinions from EMA’s Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use (CHMP) on marketing authorization applications for new therapies, which will progress to formal approvals 67 days from now. Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, the committee’s March meeting was held virtually.

Before becoming the global head of Johnson & Johnson External Innovation, William Hait spent 30 years in academic medicine focused on oncology. Whenever he speaks to a group, the first question he asks is if there is anyone in the room that would like to get a disease.

DUBLIN – Bio-Europe Spring’s virtual panel on the partnering dynamic between big pharma and microbiome-focused biotech firms was essentially an in-house webinar hosted by Seventure Partners, a Paris-based venture capital fund that has led the way in investing in microbiome-related therapeutics, diagnostics and other products.