Washington is increasing pressure on Beijing to crack down on illegal supplies of raw materials used to make the synthetic drug fentanyl, warning the deadly overdose crisis sweeping the US could soon spread to Europe and Asia. Dr Rahul Gupta, the White House drugs tsar, told the Financial Times it is only a matter of […]
Scientists have urged the US government to increase investment in lab monkey breeding programmes as a smuggling scandal in Cambodia risks worsening a shortage of test animals that is hurting the life sciences sector. Academics pursuing some studies already face delays of up to a year due to the difficulty in sourcing so called non-human […]
Japan’s Eisai has refused to rule out the possibility its Alzheimer’s drug contributed to brain bleeds in two patients who died during clinical trials but insisted its medicine was not responsible for their deaths. The company said the deaths could not be directly attributed to lecanemab, a drug it is developing with Biogen that slows […]
Bristol Myers Squibb says it expects to cancel some drug development programmes due to US government drug pricing rules that are due to be phased in from next year. Giovanni Caforio, chief executive of the US drugmaker, told the Financial Times it was reviewing its portfolio and expected that some drug candidates would not be […]
The chief executive of Bristol Myers Squibb has warned that the US pharmaceutical company could divert investment away from the UK due to the expansion of a levy designed to limit the NHS’s medicines bill. Giovanni Caforio also said low pricing for medicines purchased by the NHS from pharmaceutical companies was a major issue that […]
Some Eli Lilly employees have requested transfers from the company’s Indiana operations following the Republican-controlled state government’s enactment of legislation to ban most abortions in the state. David Ricks, Lilly’s chief executive, told the Financial Times some staff had asked to relocate outside the state even though an Indiana judge has temporarily halted the proposed […]
One of China’s most prominent biotech companies said it was “mind-boggling” that Beijing has not allowed sales of Covid-19 vaccines using technology pioneered by Moderna and BioNTech/Pfizer. BeiGene’s research chief told the Financial Times it was “unfortunate” that Chinese authorities had not approved messenger RNA shots, which provide longer lasting and higher levels of protection […]
Joe Biden’s chief medical adviser has warned that the demonisation of Covid-19 jabs could spill over into childhood immunisation programmes and lead to outbreaks of disease. Dr Anthony Fauci told the Financial Times that political divisions in public health was preventing a “laser-beam focus” on the common enemy — coronavirus. Some US states were not […]
At least 17mn people in Europe experienced long Covid during the first two years of the pandemic, World Health Organization modelling suggests, highlighting the scale of the public health challenges posed by a condition that encompasses cognitive problems, fatigue and shortness of breath. The modelling, based on data compiled by researchers at the University of […]
Health experts have warned that the US decision to roll out new Covid boosters without clinical testing on humans risks denting public trust and increasing hesitancy about vaccines. The Joe Biden administration is using the bivalent boosters, which contain the original Covid strain and the genetic code of the Omicron sub-variants BA4 and BA5, to […]