Global News

[ad_1] A banner hanging from on overpass along the southbound lane of I-83 that says, "Deny Defend Depose Health Care 4 All." Lloyd Fox | Baltimore Sun | Tribune News Service | Getty Images Major insurance stocks have fallen more than 6% since their closing prices last Tuesday, the day before the deadly shooting of Brian Thompson, CEO of UnitedHealth Group 's insurance arm, in midtown Manhattan.  That includes UnitedHealth, CVS Health and Cigna , which operate three of the nation's largest private health insurers. Thompson, 50, led UnitedHealthcare, the largest private payer of health insurance benefits in the U.S.  Luigi Mangione , 26, is accused of fatally shooting Thompson outside the Hilton hotel in midtown Manhattan early Wednesday last week, as the CEO headed to UnitedHealth Group's investor day. Investigators have said Mangione was a critic of the health-care industry, a view some Americans sympathized with online in the days after Thompson's d...

[ad_1] In this photo illustration, Abbott's at-home covid-19 rapid test kits are seen on display in Orlando. Paul Hennessy | LightRocket | Getty Images As Covid cases surge again in the U.S., Americans are digging out unused at-home tests that they stashed earlier on in the pandemic.  Many of those tests may have passed their expiration dates , but don't throw them away just yet.  The Food and Drug Administration has extended the expiration dates of many popular at-home test products, which means some of your old kits may still be safe to use. You can check by visiting a page on the FDA's website that lists expiration information for each test brand. "That's the first thing I would do before using an expired test or throwing it away," Andrew Pekosz, a professor at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, told CNBC. If the date has not changed, the FDA advises against using expired tests. Doing so increases the chance of an inaccurate tes...

[ad_1] A person receives a COVID-19 vaccination dose, during a free distribution of COVID-19 rapid test kits for those who received vaccination shots or booster shots, at Union Station on January 7, 2022 in Los Angeles, California. Mario Tama | Getty Images The U.S. Food and Drug Administration 's independent panel of advisors raised doubts about the need to "periodically" update Covid vaccines, noting that it's unclear if the virus is seasonal like the flu. Advisors on Thursday unanimously voted that new jabs for the fall should be monovalent — meaning they are designed against one variant of Covid — and target one of the omicron XBB strains . Those are now the dominant variants nationwide.  But the original voting question included language about whether the panel recommends a "periodic update" to Covid shots.  Dr. Peter Marks, head of the FDA's vaccine division, asked the panel's chair to strike the wording from the question after severa...

[ad_1] Life expectancy in the U.S. is between three and five years lower than the average in other high-income countries — and the gap comes in part from misinformation, Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Dr. Robert Califf said. "It's looking worse, not better, over the last several years," Califf told CNBC in an interview Thursday at the agency's headquarters in Silver Spring, Maryland. It's not just the Covid pandemic contributing to the decline, he said, pointing out the gap with peer nations is widening. Califf said a new factor has joined the list of known causes of life-expectancy disparities like race, ethnicity, income and education: living in a rural area, where he noted that people are exposed to different information sources. "Why aren't we using medical products as effectively and efficiently as our peer countries? A lot of it has to do with choices that people make because of the things that influenced their thinking," Calif...

[ad_1] The newly FDA approved Alzheimer's treatment Leqembi is prepared at Abington Neurological Associates in Abington, PA., on Tuesday, November 7, 2023.  Hannah Yoon | The Washington Post | Getty Images The breakthrough Alzheimer's drug Leqembi slowed disease progression in patients over three years, demonstrating the need for them to stay on the treatment long term, according to new data released Tuesday by Japanese drugmaker Eisai .  The study results on Leqembi, which Eisai shares with Biogen , also found that a patient's Alzheimer's disease worsens after they stop treatment. Rates of adverse side effects associated with Leqembi, including brain bleeding and swelling, dropped after six months of treatment, Dr. Lynn Kramer, Eisai's chief clinical officer of deep human biology learning, told CNBC.  That decline is critical: Those side effects in the brain have raised concerns among some doctors and are the main reason a European drug regulator recommend...

[ad_1] A nurse prepares a dose of Moderna Covid-19 vaccine at Oltepesi Dispensary in Kajiado, Kenya, on September 9, 2021. Patrick Meinhardt | AFP | Getty Images Moderna on Thursday said it has paused plans to build a vaccine-manufacturing site in Kenya after a steep drop in demand for its Covid vaccines . The biotech company said it has not received any vaccine orders for Africa since 2022 and has taken more than $1 billion in losses and write-downs related to the cancellation of previous orders from the continent. Moderna's decision aligns with its broader effort to cut costs by resizing its Covid vaccine-manufacturing footprint. The company's business took a major hit last year as demand for those jabs waned worldwide, with people relying less on protective vaccines and treatments against the virus. Shares of Moderna fell 45% last year, but the stock is up around 6% this year. In March 2022, the company said it would invest about $500 million in the Kenyan site and...

[ad_1] A messy legal fight over the Food and Drug Administration's approval of the abortion pill mifepristone poses risks to the biopharma industry that go beyond the single drug. If a subsequent decision tosses out the pill's approval, it could potentially stifle innovation in the sector and deter investments in the development of life-changing drugs, biopharma companies and experts in law and economics say.  related investing news The ruling Friday by U.S. District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk of Amarillo, Texas, appears to be the first time a court has suspended the FDA's approval of a medication. The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals late Wednesday partly granted the Biden administration's request to put the order on hold, making mifepristone available for now but with significant restrictions .  The Justice Department will seek emergency intervention from the U.S. Supreme Court, it said Thursday. Nationwide access to mifepristone still hangs in the balance as the...

[ad_1] Eli Lilly logo is shown on one of the company's offices in San Diego, California, U.S., September 17, 2020.  Mike Blake | Reuters Eli Lilly on Tuesday reported first-quarter adjusted profit that topped Wall Street's expectations and hiked its full-year guidance on strong sales of its blockbuster diabetes drug Mounjaro and newly launched weight loss treatment Zepbound. The drugmaker now expects full-year adjusted earnings of $13.50 to $14.00 per share, up from previous guidance of $12.20 to $12.70 per share. Eli Lilly also expects revenue for the year to come in between $42.4 billion and $43.6 billion, an increase of $2 billion at either end of the range. Analysts surveyed by LSEG expected full-year adjusted earnings of $12.50 per share and sales of $41.44 billion.  The company said the boosted guidance is in part due to optimism around increased production of Zepbound, Mounjaro and similar drugs for the rest of the year. "Now that we're four months into th...

[ad_1] A photo showing the logo of Swiss pharmaceutical giant Roche in Basel. SEBASTIEN BOZON | AFP | Getty Images Swiss health care company Roche announced it would acquire Telavant Holdings Monday, in a deal worth $7.1 billion. Telavant creates drugs for people suffering from inflammatory and fibrotic diseases, and is in the process of developing a "promising new therapy" for patients with Crohn's disease, Roche said in a press release. This is a breaking news story, please check back later for more. [ad_2] Source link https://worldnews2023.com/top-stories/swiss-pharma-giant-roche-agrees-7-1-billion-deal-to-buy-telavant-holdings/?feed_id=305695&_unique_id=66650006a8e9d

[ad_1] Eli Lilly headquarters in Indianapolis, Indiana, US, on Wednesday, May 3, 2023. Eli Lilly & Co.'s shares climbed in early US trading after its experimental drug for Alzheimer's slowed the progress of the disease in a final-stage trial, paving the way for the company to apply for US approval. AJ Mast | Bloomberg | Getty Images Eli Lilly said Friday that the Food and Drug Administration has pushed back its approval decision deadline for the drugmaker's experimental Alzheimer's treatment donanemab in a surprise move. The agency plans to call a last-minute meeting of its outside advisors to further review the treatment's safety and efficacy in a late-stage trial, Eli Lilly said. The FDA has not disclosed the date of that meeting, so a potential approval would likely come after this month. The FDA was expected to decide whether to greenlight the medicine by the end of the first quarter. That deadline was already delayed from an expected approval last ye...

[ad_1] President Joe Biden delivers remarks about the Build Back Better legislation's new rules around prescription drug prices in the East Room of the White House on December 06, 2021 in Washington, DC. Chip Somodevilla | Getty Images Five of Pfizer's drugs will cost less for Medicare recipients starting next month as part of President Joe Biden's plan to lower prescription drug costs, the Department of Health and Human Services said Wednesday.  Pfizer's drugs are among the first set of 27 Part B prescription drugs that will be subject to Medicare inflation rebates starting April 1, according to the department. That requires Pfizer and other prescription drug companies to refund Medicare through rebates because the prices for those drugs rose faster than the rate of inflation.  Pfizer's drugs include the blood thinner Fragmin , which was approved by the Food and Drug Administration in 1994. It also includes Atgam , a medicine used to treat symptoms of Renal...

[ad_1] Syringe with Covid-19 vaccine against the XBB Variant. Fight against virus Covid-19 Coronavirus, Vaccination and immunization. Undefined Undefined | Istock | Getty Images U.S. Food and Drug Administration staff on Monday said updated Covid boosters should target XBB omicron subvariants for the upcoming fall and winter vaccination campaign.  The U.S. should use a monovalent vaccine targeting either XBB.1.5, XBB.1.16, or XBB.2.3, collectively the dominant strains nationwide, the staff said in a briefing document .  related investing news The FDA staff made the conclusion ahead of a meeting on Thursday, when a panel of external advisors to the agency will recommend a strain for new Covid shots to target later this year. There is no set date for when the vaccination campaign will begin. Vaccine manufacturers will be expected to update their shots once that strain is selected. Pfizer , Moderna and Novavax are already developing versions of their respective vaccines targeti...

[ad_1] Novo Nordisk CEO Lars Fruergaard Jørgensen on Friday said the company's experimental weight loss pill , amycretin, could eventually become a best-in-class treatment for obesity.  The Danish drugmaker is racing to capitalize on the runaway success of its blockbuster weight loss drug Wegovy by developing a new generation of treatments for obesity, including more convenient and potentially cheaper pills.  His remarks came one day after Novo Nordisk impressed investors with early-stage trial data on amycretin. Patients on the pill lost about 13.1% of their weight after 12 weeks, Jørgensen said on CNBC's "Money Movers."  That surpasses the 6% weight loss seen in those who took Wegovy after the same time period. It also adds to the growing enthusiasm around the potential of weight loss pills.  Lars Fruergaard Jørgensen, CEO of Novo Nordisk, speaks during an interview in New York on Aug. 10, 2022. Christopher Goodney | Bloomberg | Getty Images Along with conv...