Pictured: Novo Nordisk building in California/iStock, hapabapa Thursday, Novo Nordisk filed legal complaints against three pharmacies in Florida and one in Tennessee for allegedly selling products that contain semaglutide, the active compound in the company’s best-selling weight-loss and diabetes drugs Ozempic, Wegovy and Rybelsus, Bloomberg reported. Novo filed three separate lawsuits in Florida federal court, targeting three compounding pharmacies: WellHealth, TruLife Pharmacy and Brooksville Pharmaceuticals. A fourth lawsuit was filed in Tennessee against DCA Pharmacy. The Danish drugmaker is asking the courts to block these pharmacies from marketing their semaglutide-containing products and is seeking unspecified financial damages. This latest round of lawsuits comes two weeks after Novo sent out a barrage of legal complaints against wellness and weight loss clinics, medical spas and other compounding pharmacies, also claiming that these businesses were selling products containing semaglutide. Semaglutide is a peptide that mimics the GLP-1 hormone to active its counterpart receptor. In turn, this induces the pancreas to secrete ...
PacBio, a leading developer of high-quality, highly accurate sequencing solutions, today announced that Bioscientia is using its Revio long-read sequencing system to expand its genomics research projects and sequence several thousand human genomes per year. Part of Sonic Healthcare Group, Bioscientia is a leading global provider of clinical laboratory testing services for diagnostics based in Germany. The increased accuracy, read length and methylation insights offered by the Revio system will enable Bioscientia to explore certain monogenic disorders, such as deafness, blindness, and developmental delay, and study the underlying causes of rare diseases. “Bioscientia is a world-leading provider of testing services, and we are thrilled that they have chosen Revio to explore the potential clinical use of long-read sequencing,” said Christian Henry, President and Chief Executive Officer of PacBio. “Revio will help enable Bioscientia to deliver more insights to families with fewer tests, lower overall costs, and less time spent ...
Sales of the Alzheimer’s drug Leqembi may be slow initially due to logistical requirements but could pick up in 2024, analysts said after the groundbreaking treatment won approval in the U.S. Wall Street is chewing over the Food and Drug Administration’s Thursday approval of Leqembi – a milestone in the treatment of the disease, even though the drug isn’t a cure. Leqembi, from drugmakers Eisai and Biogen, is the first medicine proven to slow the progression of Alzheimer’s in people at the early stages of the memory-robbing disease. Medicare on Thursday announced it is now covering the antibody treatment for patients enrolled in the insurance program for seniors, broadening access for those who can’t afford the drug’s hefty $26,500-a-year price tag. But coverage comes with several conditions. Analysts believe certain Medicare requirements and new guidance on Leqembi’s prescription label could potentially weigh on sales of the ...
The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has awarded priority review for Astellas Pharma’s biologics licence application (BLA) for zolbetuximab to treat gastric cancer patients. Zolbetuximab is an investigational monoclonal antibody that acts on Claudin 18.2 (CLDN18.2). It is intended for use as a first-line therapy for HER2-negative gastric or gastroesophageal junction (GEJ) adenocarcinoma that is locally advanced, unresectable or metastatic, with tumours that are CLDN18.2-positive. Zolbetuximab is the first treatment targeting CLDN18.2 to be offered in the region for such patients. A decision on the approval by the regulatory agency is anticipated on 12 January 2024. The application is based on the Phase III SPOTLIGHT and GLOW clinical trial findings. Zolbetuximab was assessed along with a regimen comprising oxaliplatin, leucovorin and fluorouracil (mFOLFOX6) in the SPOTLIGHT trial. The GLOW trial analysed zolbetuximab in combination with a chemotherapy regimen comprising capecitabine and oxaliplatin (CAPOX). Astellas immuno-oncology development ...
As demand skyrockets for GLP-1 drugs that can trigger significant weight loss, unauthorized versions of the treatments have started to fill pharmacies. In late May, the FDA warned of illegal knockoffs of Novo Nordisk’s Ozempic and Wegovy. Now, five weeks later, the Danish company has filed its second wave of lawsuits against pharmacies in the U.S. that are producing the copycats. Thursday, in federal courts in Florida and Tennessee, the company accused four companies of making compounded versions of its products that are not approved by the FDA. “Testing new drugs and obtaining the regularly acquired regulatory approval to sell them are time-consuming and very costly,” Novo said in its complaints. “Ignoring drug-approval requirements provides defendant an unfair competitive advantage over pharmaceutical manufacturers like Novo Nordisk. Worse, it puts patients at risk by exposing them to drugs that have not been shown to be safe or effective.” The defendants are compounding ...
Cipla, which was recently hit with a 23-page Form 483 filing from the FDA, is adding to the albuterol supply strain with a U.S. recall of six batches of the asthma med.The company’s voluntary recall of albuterol sulfate inhalation aerosol is a result of a container defect, Cipla said in a filing with the Bombay Stock Exchange. Specifically, a market complaint flagged leakage in one inhaler, the company said. The leak was spotted in the inhaler valve, leading Cipla to pull all of the lots of the drug that used that same batch of valves from U.S. shelves. The company made the move “out of an abundance of caution,” it noted in the release. The lots were manufactured in November of 2021 and expire this November. “Cipla maintains stringent quality processes to assess quality defects and safety issues,” the company said in the filing. “Cipla conducts regular investigation and assessment by committees consisting ...
A study led by Nagoya University in Japan has identified three previously unknown membrane proteins in ovarian cancer. Using a unique technology consisting of nanowires with a polyketone coating, the group succeeded in capturing the proteins, demonstrating a new detection method for identification of ovarian cancer. The study is published in the journal Science Advances. The discovery of new biomarkers is important for detecting ovarian cancer, as the disease is difficult to detect in its early stages where it can most easily be treated. One approach to detecting cancer is to look for extracellular vesicles (EVs), especially small proteins released from the tumor called exosomes. As these proteins are found outside the cancer cell, they can be isolated from body fluids, such as blood, urine, and saliva. However, the use of these biomarkers is hindered by the lack of reliable ones for the detection of ovarian cancer. A research group led by ...
Patients undergoing bilateral total knee arthroplasty (TKA) are at an increased risk of several types of complications, as compared with matched patients undergoing unilateral TKA, reports a study in The Journal of Bone & Joint Surgery. The journal is published in the Lippincott portfolio in partnership with Wolters Kluwer. “Patients who underwent simultaneous bilateral TKA were at higher risk of experiencing postoperative complications such as pulmonary embolism, stroke, blood loss anemia, and requiring a transfusion,” according to the report by Nathanael D. Heckmann, MD, and colleagues of Keck School of Medicine of USC, Los Angeles. Study in matched groups of patients clarifies risks of bilateral TKA TKA is a highly effective treatment for patients with advanced osteoarthritis of the knee, decreasing pain and improving function. When both knees are affected, bilateral TKA offers some advantages over sequential unilateral TKA, including less time in the hospital, a single rehabilitation period, and ...
Starting this July, people diagnosed with Alzheimer’s before age 65 will have a new opportunity to connect with others while exploring the great outdoors through a program called SOAR. The name is an acronym for Shared Outdoor Adventures for Resilience. Offered by the UW Medicine Memory and Brain Wellness Center, SOAR will feature free monthly hikes in the Puget Sound area for small groups of people with younger-onset Alzheimer’s. Each participant brings along a family member or friend. A lifelong recreation specialist from Seattle Parks and Recreation will lead the hikes. Optional transportation is provided. Hikes will be up to 3 or 4 miles. The type of terrain will vary among the different hikes to provide a challenge but still be accessible to a wide range of participants. Volunteer naturalists will join periodically to talk about plants and animals in the region. SOAR will conclude with a nature retreat at ...
Pfizer has invested $25m in the clinical-stage, clustered, regularly interspaced, short palindromic repeats, genome-editing biopharmaceutical firm, Caribou Biosciences. Pfizer purchased 4,690,431 common shares of Caribou at $5.33 per share. Pfizer global product development multiple myeloma vice-president and development head Sriram Krishnaswami will now join the scientific advisory board of Caribou. The investment will be used to progress an immune-cloaked allogeneic CAR-T cell therapy, CB-011. The company is currently evaluating the cell therapy in a Phase I CaMMouflage clinical trial for relapsed or refractory multiple myeloma. The US Food and Drug Administration granted fast track designation for CB-011 in April 2023. The complete ownership and control of the pipeline comprising allogeneic CAR-T and CAR-NK cell therapies will be retained by Caribou. Caribou president and CEO Rachel Haurwitz stated: “We believe Pfizer’s investment in Caribou highlights the potential of our clinical programmes and we are excited to establish this partnership with one ...
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