Private equity group reaches deal to buy Medline for $34bn: “A consortium of private equity groups, comprising Blackstone, Carlyle and Hellman & Friedman, has reached a deal to buy a majority stake in US medical supply group Medline for about $34bn, including debt, in what is the largest buyout of the year. The transaction, announced by Medline on Saturday, is the largest buyout involving a club of private equity investors since the 2007 financial crisis. It ranks as one of the largest-ever private equity deals, behind the $44bn buyout of US energy group TXU Corporation in 2007…
Medline said that after the transaction it would continue to be led by the Mills family, which would remain its largest shareholder.”
About Covid-19
COVID-19 Vaccine-Reluctant in U.S. Likely to Stay That Way: From Gallup: “As of the May 18-23 survey, 60% of U.S. adults report they have been fully vaccinated against COVID-19, 4% have been partially vaccinated, 12% plan to be vaccinated and 24% do not plan to be vaccinated.
Among those not planning to be vaccinated, 78% say they are unlikely to reconsider their plans, including 51% who say they are "not likely at all" to change their mind and get vaccinated. That leaves one in five vaccine-reluctant adults open to reconsidering, with 2% saying they are very likely and 19% saying they are somewhat likely to change their mind and get vaccinated -- equivalent to 5% of all U.S. adults.”
A New Type Of COVID-19 Vaccine Could Debut Soon: “The first protein subunit COVID-19 vaccine to become available will likely come from the biotech company, Novavax. In contrast to the three vaccines already authorized in the U.S., it contains the spike protein itself — no need to make it, it's already made — along with an adjuvant that enhances the immune system's response, to make the vaccine even more protective.”
Complete protection by a single dose skin patch delivered SARS-CoV-2 spike vaccine: “Here, we use the high-density microarray patch [HD-MAP] to deliver a SARS-CoV-2 spike subunit vaccine directly to the skin. We show the vaccine, dry-coated on the patch is thermostable, and delivery of spike via HD-MAP induced greater cellular and antibody immune responses, with serum able to potently neutralize clinically relevant isolates including those from the B.1.1.7 and B.1.351 lineages. Finally, a single dose of HD-MAP-delivered spike provided complete protection from a lethal virus challenge, demonstrating that HD-MAP delivery of a SARS-CoV-2 vaccine is superior to traditional needle-and-syringe vaccination and has the potential to greatly impact the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.”
Antibody-laden nasal spray could provide COVID protection — and treatment: “A nasal spritz of a designer antibody offers strong protection against variants of the coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 — at least in mice.”
About health insurance
Now Is The Time For Payvider Adoption & Growth: “In this report, the Guidehouse Center for Health Insights identifies markets where payvider [Payer/Provider] models are best positioned to disrupt incumbent hospitals, health systems, and health plans. The analysis is based on projected growth in health plan membership under capitated payment arrangements, relative to current utilization, cost, and quality performance.” Graph 1 on page 9 is worth a look even if you do not read the entire piece.
Biden turns to Obama to help boost health care enrollment: “The [HHS] report says 11.3 million people are covered through the health law’s marketplaces, where subsidized private plans are offered. An additional 14.8 million are covered through expanded Medicaid, the report adds. All but a dozen states have accepted the law’s Medicaid expansion, which mainly serves low-income working adults. And 1 million are covered by so-called basic health plans, an option created by the law and offered in a limited number of states.
That accounts for enrollment of about 27 million people. But the Biden administration is also claiming credit for four million people who would have been eligible for Medicaid without Obama’s law.”
CMS Announces $80 Million Funding Opportunity Available for Navigators in States with a Federally-Facilitated Marketplace: “The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) issued the 2021 Navigator Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO), which will make $80 million in grant funding available to Navigators in states with a Federally-Facilitated Marketplace (FFM) for the 2022 plan year. This is the largest funding allocation CMS has made available for Navigator grants to date. With the additional funding, CMS encourages current and past Navigators to apply, especially those that focus on education, outreach and enrollment efforts to underserved and diverse communities.”
UnitedHealthcare may not cover ER care it deems nonemergent: “ED claims will be evaluated based on many factors, including:
The patient’s presenting problem
The intensity of diagnostic services performed
Other patient complicating factors and external causes”
This action is a significant trend back to the original operation of these commercial plans. They never intended ERs to be places of first contact for non-urgent/emergent care. This change will not affect some states’ beneficiaries (such as Illinois) where laws say insurers have to cover almost all of these visits regardless of reason.
Effect of the Million Hearts Cardiovascular Disease Risk Reduction Model on Initiating and Intensifying Medications: “In this prespecified secondary analysis of a cluster randomized, pragmatic trial that included 125 436 Medicare patients, the rate of initiation or intensification was 37% for patients enrolled by organizations paid to assess and reduce cardiovascular risk vs 32% for patients enrolled by organizations that were not, indicating a statistically significant difference.”
About the public’s health
Despite pandemic, level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere hits historic levels: “Economies worldwide nearly ground to a halt over the 15 months of the coronavirus pandemic, leading to a startling drop in global greenhouse gas emissions.
But that did little to slow the steady accumulation of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, which reached the highest levels since accurate measurements began 63 years ago, scientists said Monday.
‘Fossil fuel burning is really at the heart of this. If we don’t tackle fossil fuel burning, the problem is not going to go away,’ Ralph Keeling, a geochemist at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography…”
Fake patient reviews are making it increasingly hard to seek medical help on Google, Yelp and other directory sites: “Posting fraudulent reviews may be illegal under federal and state laws if there is financial gain involved. But enforcement is scattershot, and it is hard to find cases of disciplinary action from professional bodies for review fraud…
Although there is no easy way to quantify how many physicians and health-care providers are faking reviews, Curtis Boyd, the CEO and founder of Objection Co., which specializes in identifying fake local business reviews for business owners, estimated that as many as 20 percent of businesses in the health-care industry including doctors have suspicious review activity on Google and Yelp.”
Association of Opioid Agonist Treatment [OAT] With All-Cause Mortality and Specific Causes of Death Among People With Opioid Dependence: “Among the cohort studies, the rate of all-cause mortality during OAT was more than half of the rate seen during time out of OAT (RR, 0.47; 95% CI, 0.42-0.53). This association was consistent regardless of patient sex, age, geographic location, HIV status, and hepatitis C virus status and whether drugs were taken through injection. Associations were not different for methadone (RR, 0.47; 95% CI, 0.41-0.54) vs buprenorphine (RR, 0.34; 95% CI, 0.26-0.45)…
However, access to OAT remains limited, and insurance coverage remains low. Work to improve access globally may have important population-level benefits.”
About pharma
FDA approves first drug to slow decline of Alzheimer’s disease: “The Food and Drug Administration on Monday approved the first Alzheimer’s treatment to slow cognitive decline, a move likely to be hailed by patients and advocates but sharply criticized by others who argued there was not sufficient evidence the drug works.
The medication, called aducanumab, is for people with mild cognitive impairment or early-stage dementia both caused by Alzheimer’s. It is the first drug cleared that is designed to alter the course of the disease by slowing the deterioration of brain function — not just to ease symptoms. No Alzheimer’s treatment has been approved since 2003, reflecting the extraordinarily high failure rate of drugs developed for the illness.”
U.S. FDA approves Novo Nordisk's semaglutide as obesity treatment: “The drugmaker said it was expecting to launch the drug, which would be sold under the brand name Wegovy, in the United States later in June 2021.”
ASCO21 round-up: Things that got our attention...: “The American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) annual meeting officially kicked off on Friday…” Check this article for “a few notable presentations that caught our eye.”
Bristol Myers Squibb faces $6.4B lawsuit over delaying cancer drug’s approval: “Bristol Myers Squibb was sued for $6.4 billion June 3 for allegedly delaying the FDA approval of its cancer drug Breyanzi so it could avoid making a milestone payment to the shareholders of Celgene, which the drugmaker acquired in 2019.
The lawsuit was filed by UMB Bank, acting as a trustee for ex-Celgene shareholders. It said Bristol Myers Squibb delayed Breyanzi's approval so it wouldn't have to make a $6.4 billion milestone payment tied to the approval. It alleged the drugmaker failed to fulfill its contract with Celgene because it did not employ ‘diligent efforts’ to win the drug's approval by the Dec. 31, 2020, deadline laid out in the agreement.”
Trends in Retail Prices of Brand Name Prescription Drugs Widely Used
by Older Americans, 2006 to 2020: From the AARP: “Retail prices for widely used brand name
prescription drugs increased substantially faster • than general inflation in every year from 2006 to 2020. Between 2019 and 2020, retail prices for 260 brand name prescription drugs widely used by older Americans, including Medicare beneficiaries, increased by an average of 2.9 percent. In contrast, the general inflation rate was 1.3 percent over the same period.” Brand name drug prices rose much faster than average.
Read the article for more details. Check Figure B-1 on page 21 for an interesting finding.
About healthcare IT
Walmart Health files plans to expand virtual care into 16 more states: “Walmart told Insider the filings are related to the retail giant's telehealth push, not for its physical primary care clinics. Walmart Health's deal to buy virtual care provider MeMD, announced in May, is pending.”
Google reassigns global head of diversity and research over 2007 blog about Jews: FYI.
Before attacking IT systems, hackers stole information from 147K patients, Scripps Health says: “Before deploying ransomware on Scripps Health's computer network, cybercriminals stole data on close to 150,000 patients.
The San Diego-based health system said it is notifying 147,267 patients that hackers acquired some health and personal financial information during last month's ransomware attack.
The information could include names, addresses, dates of birth, health insurance information, medical record numbers, patient account numbers, clinical information and treatment information, the health system said.”
One Medical to acquire Iora Health in $2.1B all-stock deal: “Tech-enabled primary care provider One Medical has entered into an agreement to acquire Iora Health, another primary care competitor focused on Medicare patients, in a $2.1 billion deal.
One Medical has largely focused on care for the commercially insured, so a union with Iora Health will broaden its reach in the Medicare space, the two companies announced Monday morning. The deal would expand One Medical's potential market opportunity to $870 billion.”