Inhaled drugs developer Vectura Group plc has accepted a takeover bid from tobacco firm Philip Morris International Inc. (PMI), a move that has sparked revulsion from health campaigners but has been supported by investors. Shares in both firms ticked up in trading on Aug. 13 after Chippenham, U.K.-based Vectura accepted a bid worth around £1.1 billion (US$1.5 billion), rejecting a rival bid from U.S.-based private equity firm Carlyle Group.
Finding a functional cure to HIV is one of the biggest challenges in modern medicine, a task made so much tougher because of the virus’s ability to incorporate itself permanently into a host’s genome. But Diaccurate SAB, of Paris, thinks it may have a solution – and it’s all down to a discovery showing that the virus seems to make crucial immune CD4 cells go “bumpy”, lose their function and die.
LONDON – Stopping people under 40 from receiving Astrazeneca plc’s COVID-19 vaccine has put an end to the serious blood-clotting syndrome associated with the product, with no new cases in the U.K. for the past four weeks, according to an expert panel of hematologists.
The U.K.’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has accused Pfizer Inc., together with a smaller U.K. player, of illegally overcharging the National Health Service (NHS) for the anti-epilepsy drug branded Epanutin (phenytoin sodium) before it went off patent in 2012.
The U.K.’s National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) is playing catch-up after seeing its workflow disrupted by the COVID-19 pandemic and has made the first funding approval using a new fast track appraisal process.
LONDON – The U.K. has set up the first randomized controlled trial of COVID-19 vaccines in pregnant women, to assess different dosing schedules. The aim is to find the balance between longer intervals that are known to spur a greater immune response, against shorter intervals that provide faster protection.
The U.K.’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) hit Advanz Pharma Corp. Ltd. and two private equity firms July 29 with fines totaling more than £100 million (US$139 million) for increasing the price of a thyroid drug by more than 6,000% since 2007.
LONDON – More than six years after the technical specification was agreed, the EMA clinical trial information system (CTIS) has cleared the final hurdle and can go live in January 2022, after notice of approval was published in the EU Official Journal on Saturday July 31. The approval, following an independent audit of the system, was the spur for the EMA to intensify the training program it is putting in place for trial sponsors and national regulators, to ensure CTIS’ successful implementation.
LONDON – T-knife Therapeutics GmbH closed a $110 million series B, as it advances plans for the phase I/II trial of its first fully human T-cell receptor (TCR) in the treatment of solid tumors, which is due to start later this year.
LONDON – Relaxing of control measures such as mask wearing and social distancing at a time when most of a population has been vaccinated against COVID-19 greatly increases the probability of the emergence of a vaccine-resistant strain, according to a new modeling study.
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