About Covid-19
Performance of Rapid Antigen Tests [(Ag-RDTs]to Detect Symptomatic and Asymptomatic SARS-CoV-2 Infection “The performance of Ag-RDTs was optimized when asymptomatic participants tested 3 times at 48-hour intervals and when symptomatic participants tested 2 times separated by 48 hours.”
About health insurance/insurers
The Medicare Advantage Quality Bonus Program The Urban Institute points out flaws in this Program and suggests remedies. Among the findings: While clinical quality measures account for over half of the measures used in the star rating system, after weighting, about two-thirds of a contract’s star rating is determined by beneficiary experience with care and MA administrative effectiveness. On review, however, we find that:
—measures of beneficiary experience do not permit meaningful distinctions across MA contracts and
—administrative effectiveness measures do not target important deficiencies regulators have identified within MA organizations.”
About hospitals and healthcare systems
13 healthcare mergers and acquisitions making headlines in June FYI
About pharma
FDA approves first Alzheimer’s therapy shown to clearly slow cognitive decline “The Food and Drug Administration on Thursday granted full approval to the first therapy for Alzheimer’s disease clearly shown to slow the cognitive decline associated with the disease — a milestone in treatment, even if the benefits are modest.
The drug, called Leqembi, was developed by Eisai, the Japanese pharmaceutical company, and sold in partnership with Biogen. It previously secured conditional approval in January. The FDA’s decision will broaden patient access to the drug under the Medicare program and is likely to boost sales, even as Leqembi’s benefits and safety risks continue to be a source of debate.”
Location, Location, Location: Spending Differences for Biologic and Biosimilar Medications by Site of Treatment Highlights:
“With the exception of biosimilars for Neupogen, the market share for the innovator biologics was between 65 percent and 87 percent in 2020…
For all seven innovator biologics examined, allowed charges were higher in HOPDs [hospital outpatient departments] than in POs [physician offices.] HOPD markups on innovator biologics are roughly doubling costs for employers and minimizing savings that could be achieved through biosimilar competition. Allowed charges were about double in 2019, averaging 98 percent higher. In 2020, allowed charges were more than twice as high in HOPDs, averaging 121 percent.
In 2020, the HOPD markup ranged from 75 percent to 183 percent. The HOPD markup increased between 2019 and 2020 for all innovator biologics examined.”
Sarepta sells FDA priority review voucher to mystery buyer for $102M as prices continue to slip “While the price of just about everything has increased over the last six years in the U.S., the same can’t be said for the cost of an FDA priority review voucher. Just ask Sarepta Therapeutics.
Since 2017, the Massachusetts rare disease specialist has sold off three PRVs—getting less in return for each one.
The most recent sale came Wednesday as Sarepta revealed a $102 million deal for its PRV that came along with the FDA’s endorsement two weeks ago of the company’s latest Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) treatment, gene therapy Elevidys.”
AbbVie's Skyrizi retakes TV drug ad spenders' crown in June as overall spend falls by $40M “AbbVie remained at the top of the TV drug ad spenders ranking for yet another month in June, although its immunology drug Skyrizi replaced Rinvoq, its other blockbuster medication, which held the top spot in May.
Skyrizi was in fact up two places in June from May, with AbbVie spending $26.6 million on all TV ads for the drug last month. That was $1.3 million more than it spent on Rinvoq.”
Takeda adds another F-Star collab to constellation, this time for $1B in biobucks “Takeda and F-Star Therapeutics are tacking on another bispecific antibody deal worth $1 billion in potential milestones, marking the third time the two have partnered up in a year.
Few details were disclosed in the companies’ announcement Wednesday, beyond the $1 billion in potential biobucks being on the table. The two drug developers will jointly research and develop antibodies for new immuno-oncology targets, with Takeda having an exclusive option to take select candidates forward.
About the public’s health
Study says drinking water from nearly half of US faucets contains potentially harmful chemicals “Drinking water from nearly half of U.S. faucets likely contains “forever chemicals” that may cause cancer and other health problems, according to a government study released Wednesday.
The synthetic compounds known collectively as PFAS are contaminating drinking water to varying extents in large cities and small towns — and in private wells and public systems, the U.S. Geological Survey said.”
Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program Access and Racial Disparities in Food Insecurity
“Findings In this cross-sectional study of 4974 US households, Black and multiracial households had higher rates of food insecurity than White households in adjusted analyses. This disparity was not found among households that had access to SNAP benefits.
Meaning These findings suggest that SNAP likely plays a key role in addressing food insecurity, but there are racial disparities in food insecurity among those not participating in the program.”
CDC to Reduce Funding for States’ Child Vaccination Programs “The reduction comes from a federal immunization grant — totaling about $680 million in the latest year — that supports vaccination programs for children, according to the Association of Immunization Managers…
The debt deal rescinded about $27 billion in unspent federal money that had been allocated to fight covid. It also led the CDC to remove $400 million in funding to states for workers who fight the spread of sexually transmitted infections, according to an email obtained by CQ Roll Call.”
About healthcare IT
10 largest healthcare data breaches so far in '23 FYI
HL7, WHO Partner to Drive Global Interoperability Standards Adoption “Standards-development organization Health Level Seven International (HL7) and The World Health Organization (WHO) have signed a Project Collaboration Agreement to support the global adoption of open interoperability standards.
Adopting interoperability standards is critical for consistently representing health data and information to support data exchange, regardless of the software used.
The Global Strategy on Digital Health 2020-2025 outlines a call for WHO to provide global guidance on interoperability standards adoption.”
Digital Therapeutics Alliance and Health Advances Release Definitive Framework and Definitions for Classifying Digital Health Technologies Look at the graphic- it is a useful conceptual framework for healthcare IT.
About healthcare personnel
Healthcare job cuts up 97% from 1st half of 2022 “Healthcare/products companies and manufacturers, including hospitals, announced the fourth-most job cuts among 30 industries and sectors measured in the first half of 2023, according to one new analysis.
The finding comes from a July 6 report from Challenger, Gray & Christmas…”
About healthcare finance
Eli Lilly Surpasses UnitedHealth as World’s Biggest Health-Care Firm “The drugmaker gained 0.9% on Wednesday, extending its advance after four straight months of gains while adding more than $94 billion to its value this year. Lilly ended June at a record high…
UnitedHealth closed down 1.4% and has fallen 11% so far this year.”
Thermo Fisher fronts over $900M for data intelligence company as M&A strategy takes shape “The deal will see the life sciences giant hand over $912.5 million for the Waltham, Massachusetts-based company. CorEvitas, which oversees around 300 employees, has developed a multi-therapeutic data intelligence platform to gather structured patient clinical data spanning more than 400 investigator sites and over 100,000 patients. It does this by managing 12 clinical registries, including nine autoimmune and inflammatory syndicated registries.”