About Covid-19
NIH launches Home Test to Treat, a pilot COVID-19 telehealth program “The National Institutes of Health, in collaboration with the Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Response (ASPR) at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, has launched the Home Test to Treat program, an entirely virtual community health intervention that will provide free COVID-19 health services—at-home rapid tests, telehealth sessions and at-home treatments—in selected communities. The program, first announced by the White House in September 2022, will make antiviral treatment available for eligible individuals who receive a positive test result, which could prevent severe illness, hospitalization or death…
Later this month, local and state officials in Berks County, Pennsylvania, will be the first to pilot the Home Test to Treat program. Up to 8,000 eligible residents are anticipated to participate in the program.”
XAV-19, the anti-SARS-CoV-2 GH-pAb of XENOTHERA best-in-class against all variants including BQ. 1.1 “In the context of a major resurgence of the COVID epidemic, the French biotech XENOTHERA announces recent data in favor of the strong interest of its glyco-humanized polyclonal antibody (GH-pAb) XAV-19 to treat patients in the initial viral phase of the disease.
Several neutralization assays carried out by XENOTHERA have supplemented data already published... XAV-19 exhibits a strong neutralization activity against all omicron variants, including BQ.1.1, the main variant of SARS-CoV-2 in circulation to date. In the meantime, all monoclonal antibodies today marketed loose their activity against this variant. The neutralizing concentration of XAV-19 (IC50) is identical to that measured for all other variants of SARS-CoV-2.”
About health insurance/insurers
156M Beneficiaries Receive Health Insurance Through Public Programs “More than 150 million people receive health insurance through public programs, including Medicare, Medicaid, and the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP), according to the latest enrollment data from CMS.
The data reflects enrollment in the programs as of September 2022.”
Health Insurance Providers Actions Concerning SDOH FYI
Which Parts of the United States Have the Most Consolidated Medicare Hospital Spending? Two hospital systems accounted for more than half of traditional Medicare inpatient hospital spending in 258 HRRs[hospital referral regions] and accounted for more than three-quarters of spending in 110 of the total 306 HRRs in the U.S.”
The maps also provide interesting information.
Long Island Medical Doctor Sentenced to 30 Months in Prison for Medicare Billing Fraud Scheme “From October 2015 through February 2020, the defendant submitted over $3 million in billings to Medicare for colonoscopy and gastroenterological procedures that were not performed. Most of these billings indicated that the services were rendered to disabled beneficiaries, who were living in residential group homes. Medicare reimbursed approximately $1.4 million of these false claims, none of which the defendant was entitled to receive.”
About hospitals and healthcare systems
VillageMD completes $8.9B Summit Health buy “VillageMD, which is majority owned by Walgreens Boots Alliance, completed its acquisition of Summit Health-City, MD Jan. 3, adding more than 2,800 providers to its ranks.
News of the deal's completion comes roughly two months after it was announced. On Nov. 7, VillageMD said it entered a definitive agreement to acquire Summit Health-CityMD for $8.9 billion with investments from Walgreens Boots Alliance and Evernorth, the health services portfolio of Cigna.”
About pharma
FDA approves Alzheimer’s drug shown to moderately slow cognitive decline in early stages of the disease “The drug, called Leqembi, was developed by Eisai, the Japanese pharmaceutical company that also developed the first symptomatic treatment for Alzheimer’s 25 years ago.
Leqembi will cost $26,500 per year for a person of average weight, Eisai said. The drug has the potential to be a commercial blockbuster, but only if Medicare can be convinced to pay for it.”
U.S. new drug price exceeds $200,000 median in 2022 “The median annual price of the 17 novel drugs the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved since July 2022 is $193,900, down from $257,000 in the first half of 2022, Reuters found. For full year 2022, the median was $222,003.”
The article has a list and respective costs for these drugs.
Bluebird scores $95M nest egg after selling second FDA priority review voucher to BMS “Late this week, gene therapy player bluebird said it sold the second of two rare pediatric disease priority review vouchers (PRV) from the FDA for $95 million. The buyer, according to a bluebird securities filing, was pharma major Bristol Myers Squibb.”
Comment: The companies are less important than the latest “market value” for these vouchers.
BioNTech Announces Strategic Partnership with UK Government to Provide up to 10,000 Patients with Personalized mRNA Cancer Immunotherapies by 2030 Highlights:
-”Multi-year collaboration focuses on three strategic pillars: cancer immunotherapies, infectious disease vaccines, and expansion of BioNTech’s footprint in the UK
-BioNTech aims to design and roll out randomized clinical trials with registrational potential for the Company’s personalized mRNA cancer immunotherapies in the UK
-Accelerated clinical trial recruitment with first patient to be enrolled in a trial as part of this collaboration in H2 2023
-Set-up of an R&D hub in Cambridge (UK) with the aim to employ more than 70 highly skilled scientists with the first employees commencing work in Q1 2023”
About the public’s health
South Carolina Supreme Court strikes down state abortion ban “The 3-2 decision comes nearly two years after Republican Gov. Henry McMaster signed the restriction into law. The ban after cardiac activity, which included exceptions for pregnancies by rape or incest or pregnancies that endanger the patient’s life, drew lawsuits almost immediately.
Justice Kaye Hearn, writing for the majority, said the state ‘unquestionably’ has the authority to limit the right of privacy that protects from state interference with the decision to get an abortion. But she added any limitation must afford sufficient time to determine one is pregnant and take ‘reasonable steps’ if she chooses to terminate that pregnancy.
’Six weeks is, quite simply, not a reasonable period of time for these two things to occur,’ Hearn added.”