Med-tech happenings, including deals and partnerships, grants, preclinical data and other news in brief: Abbott Laboratories, Alpha Healthcare, Anatomage, Baylis, Bioaesthetics, Biosyent, Boston Scientific, Elekta, Healthcare Services Group, Helius Medical Technologies, Humacyte, ID Genomics, Iotron Medical Meadowlands Diagnostics, Osteoid, Photocure, Provista Diagnostics.

Brii Biosciences Ltd. made strides toward getting its SARS-CoV-2 neutralizing monoclonal antibody combination therapy, BRII-196/BRII-198, to market with positive interim phase III data that show high-risk outpatients may benefit from the combination therapy up to 10 days following symptom onset.

Regulatory snapshots, including global drug submissions and approvals, clinical trial approvals and other regulatory decisions and designations: AB, Abbvie, Alimera, Antengene, Avidity, Bio-Path, Cara, Cardiol, Cassava, Celltrion, Humanetics, Immunocore, Index, Janssen, Polarityte, PTC, Roche, Stealth, Tonix, Vifor.

Biopharma happenings, including deals and partnerships, grants, preclinical data and other news in brief: Pieris, Privo, Sorrento.

Clinical updates, including trial initiations, enrollment status and data readouts and publications: Adjuvance, Awakn, Cartesian, Eom, Meiji, Nouscom, Novartis, Oramed, Oncotelic, Regeneron, Reistone, Sorrento, Theravance, Timber.

As many lower and middle-income countries continue to scramble for COVID-19 vaccine doses, which are largely being manufactured in Europe and the U.S., their own regulatory rules may be getting in the way in some instances.

As talk increases of third doses of COVID-19 vaccine, a game-changing option is delivering them intranasally instead of intramuscularly. “It’s all about nasal carriage. It’s a better way to not carry the virus and not make others sick,” Bluewillow Biologics Inc. CEO Chad Costley told BioWorld. “The most important thing is that it’s safe.”