After a long approval process, Monmouth Junction N.J.-based Cytosorbents Corp. received clearance to bring its Cytosorb blood purification technology to treat cytokine storm and deadly inflammation in critically ill and cardiac surgery patients, to the Mexican market. The COVID-19 pandemic may delay marketing plans to roll-out the product in the Latin American country.

The U.S. FDA continues to modify its emergency use authorization (EUA) policy for testing for the SARS-CoV-2 virus, although workplace testing is still on the agency’s to-do list. The FDA’s Tim Stenzel noted on a May 6 briefing that serological tests for antibodies must now demonstrate an overall sensitivity of 90% and overall specificity of 95%, a set of standards that might challenge some tests that are available under the EUA policy.

Stem cells haven’t exactly panned out as hoped when it comes to approved therapeutics. There are only a couple that have received a nod from the FDA in very specific indications. But the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic could push stem cells back into the limelight and more firmly establish them as therapeutically relevant.

LONDON – Computational biology specialist Precisionlife Ltd. has used UK Biobank data to find sepsis risk genes that are present specifically in patients who suffer severe COVID-19 infections and shown that 13 of those genes are known druggable targets.

DUBLIN – Bavarian Nordic A/S, Europe’s largest independent vaccine developer, is placing a bet on virus-like particle (VLP) technology as a potentially useful contribution to the desperate global effort to push back against SARS-CoV-2.