Crispr Therapeutics AG, of Basel, Switzerland, closed an additional $38 million of its series B financing, which brings the total to almost $140 million. Read More

Zymeworks Inc., of Vancouver, British Columbia, said it entered a research collaboration with the University of Victoria and the BC Cancer Agency to develop engineered cytokine and cytokine receptor pairs. Under the terms, the collaborators will engineer variant forms of cytokine-receptor complexes to allow precise control of cellular signaling events. Read More

Immuron Ltd., of Melbourne, Australia, said its IMM-124E phase II trial for the treatment of non-alcoholic steatohepatitis has reached its 50 percent recruitment milestone with 56 patients having been randomized and an additional four patients to be randomized last week. Read More

Researchers have isolated a broadly neutralizing antibody (bnAb) to HIV from an infant who had been infected for roughly a year, showing that bnAbs can in principle develop more rapidly than they usually do. Read More

Antibiotic resistance among microbial pathogens has increased significantly, and the WHO recognizes this to be a major threat to human health. The following figure projects the estimated number of patient deaths due to antimicrobial resistance every year by 2050: Read More

SHANGHAI – A transdermal pain patch being studied by Frontier Biotechnologies Inc., of Nanjing, China, has met its primary endpoints in a U.S. phase II trial of 146 patients with chronic lower back pain. The super-thin patch – only 200 micrometers thick – was designed to overcome safety issues common in prescription-strength painkillers for chronic pain. Read More

SHANGHAI – Discovering and developing new drugs is hard anywhere in the world but perhaps especially so in China where it is a relatively new pursuit. For those who take on the challenge of bringing new drugs to market, now there is a place to share their woes and wisdom: the New Drug Founder's Club, or NDFC for short. Read More

Pointing to a "brand-new ball game" with vasodilator Orenitram (treprostinil extended-release tablets) in pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH) and "tough competition" in the prostacyclin receptor agonist Uptravi (selexipag) from Actelion Ltd., United Therapeutics Inc. CEO Martine Rothblatt said that being able to promote her firm's therapy for reduction in morbidity and mortality – as well as improvements in exercise, as the label now proclaims – could boost sales. Read More

FDA reviewers told agency advisors in briefing docs released Friday that Jardiance (empagliflozin) postmarket data show "substantial evidence" that, for certain adults with type 2 diabetes, the drug reduces the risk of cardiovascular death. They did not recommend that the advisors support label claims that the drug could reduce the risk of either hospitalization for heart failure (HF) or a composite of CV death (excluding fatal stroke) or hospitalization for HF. Read More

LONDON – There is alarm, concern and even heartbreak across the biotech and pharma industry and among leading scientists at the vote to leave the EU. Read More

Having spent the bulk of his medical career researching infections in cancer patients undergoing chemotherapy, Stephen Schimpff, a retired CEO from the Baltimore-based University of Maryland Medical Center, knows a lot about how hospitals can make patients sick. Read More

Superbugs tend to evoke a lot of finger-pointing and the blame often spreads as wide and fast as the outbreaks themselves. But if the industry learned anything from last year's high-profile duodenoscope debacle it's that infection control is a shared responsibility. Manufacturers, third-party reprocessing firms, hospitals, regulatory bodies and lawmakers all have a role to play in protecting patients from those deadly diseases. Read More

Politicians and medical experts worldwide alike have decried the lack of innovation in antibiotics – an area that has been neglected for three decades – but another area is turning out to be just as important: diagnostics. Read More