The COVID-19 pandemic encouraged a lot of things, including shoddy product quality, but a recent FDA warning letter suggests that the associated need for tests also encouraged a few operations that had less than a full commitment to quality management.
Access to advanced therapies proved to be a major talking point at a conference in London, following the U.S. approval of Bluebird Bio Inc.’s Zynteglo (betibeglogene autotemcel) cell-based gene therapy for beta thalassemia and its $2.8 million price tag. Regulators in Europe backed Zynteglo in 2019 but Bluebird opted to withdraw the therapy in 2021 after deciding that the complex thicket of pricing bodies in Europe was too difficult to negotiate.
Five months after winning its first approval in Japan, Sanofi SA’s enzyme replacement therapy, Xenpozyme (olipudase alfa), earned a U.S. FDA nod for use in pediatric and adult patients with acid sphingomyelinase deficiency (ASMD), becoming the first medication designed to treat symptoms not related to the central nervous system.
Regulatory snapshots, including global submissions and approvals, clinical trial approvals and other regulatory decisions and designations: Baxter, Incelldx, Sensifree.
Regulatory snapshots, including global drug submissions and approvals, clinical trial approvals and other regulatory decisions and designations: Astrazeneca, Bavarian Nordic, Biocytogen, Biogen, Curis, Daiichi, Jaguar, Moderna, Novavax, Okyo, Outlook, Sanofi, Sobi, Stemcyte, Takeda, Y-mabs.
Right on cue, the U.S. FDA authorized bivalent COVID-19 vaccines from Moderna Inc. and Pfizer Inc.-Biontech SE to be given as boosters at least two months following a primary vaccine series or a previous booster. “These updated boosters present us with an opportunity to get ahead of the next wave of COVID-19,” FDA Commissioner Robert Califf said, following the Aug. 31 announcement.
It’s not always obvious whether a claim found in a patent is obvious to a “person having ordinary skill” while the patent is still in prosecution, but that lack of clarity came back to bite Best Medical International Inc., of Springfield, Va. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has ruled that a patent for conformal radiotherapy held by Best included three claims that would have been obvious to this mythical person of ordinary skill, handing a win to Stockholm-based Elekta AB, maker of the Gamma Knife radiotherapy system.
While it will need a “reasonable period of time” to do so, Turkey said Aug. 29 that it intends to establish a level playing field for foreign and domestic drug producers in accordance with the recommendations and rulings of World Trade Organization dispute arbitrators.
Brazilian regulatory agency Anvisa reported that it is participating in an investigation that launched Aug. 25 into alleged crimes of smuggling, misrepresenting, distributing and delivering proxalutamide related to a clinical trial in Brazil.
For the first time since they’ve had access to U.S. capital, biopharma and med-tech companies based in China and Hong Kong are having to comply with the same accountability standards companies in the U.S. and other countries must follow as a condition of trading on U.S. markets.
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