Some HIV patients are naturally able to keep the virus fully in check without any medicinal help, a phenomenon that has intrigued scientists for decades. New research appears to identify at least one reason why: an abnormally powerful version of an infection-fighting white blood cell called CD8+ T cell. CD8+ T cell’s are a type of T cell, a normal feature in everyone’s immune system. T cells typically amass in the lymph nodes of an HIV-infected patient. But among “spontaneous controllers”—those with the rare ability to automatically corral HIV and prevent it from triggering illness—investigators found that CD8+ T cells appear significantly more adept at identifying and stopping HIV. “About one in 300 people are able to control HIV without the need for medications,” noted study author Dr. Bruce Walker, director of the Ragon Institute of MGH, MIT and Harvard, an immune system research center in Cambridge, Mass. It appears ...
In a development that’s set to change the lives of many patients, Blueprint Medicines’ Ayvakit has finally won its long-awaited FDA approval to treat indolent systemic mastocytosis (SM). The drug won its original approval in 2021 to treat the advanced form of the disease, which affects only 5% to 10% of those with SM. Now, Ayvakit can reach the majority of SM patients, who suffer from the disease’s indolent form. The larger patient pool comprises approximately 30,000 U.S. patients, but so far only about half are diagnosed, Blueprint’s chief operating officer Christy Rossi told Fierce Pharma in an interview. Indolent SM patients often end up “living their lives in a bubble,” Rossi said. Physicians can treat symptoms, which range across organ systems from skin lesions to brain fog, but until now there was no option to treat the underlying disease. Enter Ayvakit. The drug targets a mutation called KIT D816V, ...
An intensive study into the treatment of angina has found that the use of tests for small blood vessel function in the heart clarify the underlying cause of the condition. Patients referred to hospital by their General Practitioner (GP) for assessment of chest pain were invited into the study if a heart scan had ruled out blocked heart arteries. The trial showed that the common underlying cause of chest symptoms in angina sufferers was myocardial ischaemia with no obstructive arteries (INOCA), which wasn’t diagnosed by a standard CT heart scan. The diagnosis was clarified using the tests where INOCA was 4 times more likely, while ‘normal’ results were half as less likely to detect small vessel disease. The study, funded by the British Heart Foundation and the Chief Scientist Office of the Scottish Government and sponsored by the NHS Golden Jubilee, was carried out by heart specialists from the University ...
The World Health Organization on Saturday launched a global network to help swiftly detect the threat from infectious diseases, like COVID-19, and share the information to prevent their spread. The International Pathogen Surveillance Network (IPSN) will provide a platform for connecting countries and regions, improving systems for collecting and analyzing samples, the agency said. The network aims to help ensure infectious disease threats are swiftly identified and tracked and the information shared and acted on to prevent catastrophes like the COVID pandemic. The network will rely on pathogen genomics to analyze the genetic code of viruses, bacteria and other disease-causing organisms to understand how infectious and deadly they are and how they spread. The data gathered will feed into a broader disease surveillance system used to identify and track diseases, in a bid to contain outbreaks and to develop treatments and vaccines. ‘Ambitious’ goals WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus hailed ...
Beth Snyder Bulik Senior Editor The American Lung Association is doubling down on efforts to encourage more Black Americans to join lung cancer clinical trials. The new pharma-sponsored “Awareness, Trust and Action” initiative aims to put those three words into action with a national campaign that includes digital posts and social media. The first posts are slated to go up on Saturday, which is Clinical Trials Awareness Day. Daiichi Sankyo, Genentech, Merck, Novartis and Novocure provided financial support for the project. Cedric “Jamie” Rutland “We have to do a better job of recruiting Black Americans into clinical trials and letting them know why,” said pulmonologist Cedric “Jamie” Rutland, a national volunteer medical spokesperson for the American Lung Association. “And not only that, but teaching Black Americans what lung cancer is, what the risk factors are, why they have risk factors living in heavily polluted areas … We have to ...
It looks like Intercept Pharmaceuticals’ Ocaliva still has a tough road ahead in nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH) after a panel of FDA advisers voiced concerns with the company’s application package. During a one-day meeting of the FDA’s Gastrointestinal Drugs Advisory Committee, panelists voted 12 to 2—with 2 abstentions—that the benefits of Ocaliva 25 mg, also known as Obeticholic acid, or OCA, don’t outweigh the risks in NASH patients with stage 2 or 3 fibrosis. Further, in response to the question about a potential accelerated approval, panelists voted 15 to 1 against that regulatory pathway for the drug. Many of the nay-sayer’s concerns came down to Intercept’s use of a surrogate endpoint in its clinical trial. Panelists’ concerns also centered on the potential for OCA to cause drug-induced liver injury. While the FDA isn’t beholden to the advice of its advisory committees, the regulator often follows its experts’ lead. Intercept’s NASH candidate ...
Treatment concerns up to 150,000 patients in England with chronic heart failure The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) has issued final draft guidance recommending AstraZeneca’s dapagliflozin. The therapy, also known as Forxiga, is as an option among adults with symptomatic chronic heart failure with mildly reduced or preserved ejection fraction. Currently, there are no disease-modifying treatments for this specific condition and, thus, dapagliflozin becomes the first NICE-recommended treatment for this population. Meanwhile, evidence from a clinical trial demonstrated that adding dapagliflozin to standard care with diuretics effectively decreases the combined risk of dying from cardiovascular causes or the need attend hospital with heart failure. This was compared during the study with placebo in addition to standard care. Helen Knight, director of medicines evaluation at NICE, reflected: “Until now there have been no treatments available to delay or slow the progression of this type of heart failure. “The ...
Paul Schloesser Associate Editor CureVac is going on the offensive against Pfizer and BioNTech, saying that it will seek to accelerate its litigation around patents related to the manufacture of the Covid-19 vaccine Comirnaty. The German biotech company announced Friday that the case, which originally launched in the US last summer, has been transferred from the federal district court of Massachusetts to the eastern district court in Virginia as part of an effort to speed up the litigation, potentially allowing for a trial as soon as next year. On top of that transfer going through, CureVac filed a 94-page document Friday, filled with a broader counterclaims that say Pfizer and BioNTech infringed on nine of its US patents — eight of which it claims are owned by CureVac and the ninth by CureVac Manufacturing. These patents range from producing mRNA to vaccine design and manufacturing. CureVac first filed a lawsuit ...
An outbreak of cholera has killed at least 10 people near South Africa’s capital of Pretoria, health authorities said Sunday, urging the public to be “extra vigilant”. The Department of Health in Pretoria’s Gauteng province said 95 people visited a local hospital since Monday showing cholera symptoms, including diarrhea, stomach cramps and nausea. Lab tests on Sunday confirmed at least 19 were cases of cholera, the department said in a statement, adding 37 people were still undergoing treatment. The victims included a three-year-old child and nine adults. Nomantu Nkomo-Ralehoko, the provincial head for health, said additional staff, including medics and nurses, were being mobilized to deal with the outbreak, which was centered in Hammanskraal, an area north of Pretoria. “We would like to reiterate and urge the public to avoid known or suspected contaminated food, water and surfaces and wash hands thoroughly with soap before handling food or after using ...
Cara Therapeutics and Vifor Fresenius Medical Care Renal Pharma (VFMCRP) have announced that the US’s National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) has recommended Kapruvia (difelikefalin) to treat chronic kidney disease (CKD)-associated pruritus. Kapruvia has been recommenced to treat moderate-to-severe CKD-associated pruritus in adult patients who are undergoing haemodialysis. This will allow patients in Northern Ireland, England, and Wales to get access to Kapruvia. The recommendation from NICE follows the UK’s Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) authorisation of Kapruvia for the same indication in April last year. Cara Therapeutics president and CEO Christopher Posner said: “We are pleased that Kapruvia will be available to CKD patients in England, Wales and Northern Ireland who are undergoing haemodialysis and suffering from moderate-to-severe CKD-associated pruritus. “Together with VFMCRP, we are committed to bringing our first-of-its kind therapy to providers and patients around the world to help change the way pruritus ...
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