SUMMARY: The first injection for Moderna’s vaccine trail in partnership with the National Institutes of Health aims to enroll about 30,000 people from 89 widely dispersed sites across the U.S. It is the first possible coronavirus vaccine to enter a phase three trial in the U.S. If the vaccine remains on track, Moderna previously said it will be able to deliver “approximately 500 million doses per year, and possibly up to 1 billion doses per year” starting in 2021.The company announced earlier this month that healthy adults whowere given the vaccine in the phase one trial tolerated it generally well and all…
Author: Brett Johnson
A COVID-19 vaccine called AZD1222 being developed by AstraZeneca and the University of Oxford showed “robust immune responses” in early-stage clinical trials neutralizing antibody responses in 91 percent of the participants who received a single dose of AZD1222 and 100 percent of the participants who received the booster dose. The United States announced it secured 300 million doses of the experimental vaccine—nearly one-third of the first one billion doses the drug maker plans to produce. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services pledged up to $1.2 billion to accelerate the program. Though these early trial results show that the vaccine induced a…
Mologic has announced that, following successful independent validation by the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine (LSTM) and St George’s, University of London, its professional-use rapid diagnostic test for COVID-19 has received a CE mark (meeting European Economic Area standards) and is ready for manufacture and global distribution. Rigorous independent assessment has shown the tests to have a sensitivity of up to 96% (21-28 days post-symptom onset), and specificity of 98.8% (95% CI 96.6-99.8). The test has been validated to date on 108 positive samples, 255 negative samples, and 223 cross-reacting samples in line with the WHO pre-qualification requirements. As with…
A common drug, already approved by the FDA, may also be a powerful tool in fighting COVID-19, according to research published this week. Heparin could be used as a decoy to prevent SARS-CoV-2 from infecting human cells. SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, uses a surface spike protein to latch onto human cells and initiate infection. But heparin, a blood thinner also available in non-anticoagulant varieties, binds tightly with the surface spike protein, potentially blocking the infection from happening. This makes it a decoy, which might be introduced into the body using a nasal spray or nebulizer and run interference…
Fluxergy is collaborating with Mass General Brigham (MGB) to evaluate Fluxergy’s research-use-only COVID-19 molecular-testing platform. Fluxergy will work with the MGB Center for COVID Innovation, which was launched in late March. The so-called Diagnostic Accelerator is a collaboration between the Wyss Institute and Brigham and Women’s Hospital that aims to speed up the commercialization of innovative diagnostic tests. Fluxergy’s diagnostic system comprises consumable “lab-on-chip” test cartridges called Fluxergy Cards, the Fluxergy Analyzer and FluxergyWorks software. It can provide results in under an hour, and is designed to be cost-effective and scalable, using proprietary printed circuit-board manufacturing and microfluidics technologies. See…
The U.S. has agreed to pay Pfizer Inc. and BioNTech SE nearly $2 billion to secure 100 million doses of their experimental Covid-19 vaccine to provide to all Americans free of charge. Under the $1.95 billion agreement, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and the Defense Department will receive 100 million doses of the vaccine should it be cleared by regulators, and can also acquire an additional 500 million doses. The U.S. has already made other agreements including a $1.2 billion deal with AstraZeneca PLC for at least 300 million doses of a vaccine developed by University of Oxford.…
Before you exercise outside, assess your risk. Wearing a mask can feel pretty claustrophobic. Walking through the grocery store rebreathing your own hot breath is not a pleasant sensation. Now, imagine running with it. We know by now that wearing a mask in certain circumstances is important. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) currently recommends wearing a cloth face covering in public settings where social distancing measures are hard to maintain to slow the spread of the virus. But should runners wear face masks outside? The answer: it depends. First, assess your surroundings. The most important thing…
SUMMARY: BioNTech expects to begin phase three trials, at the end of July. Gilead Sciences also announced that test results on remdesivir, the only approved treatment for COVID-19, shows a reduction in mortality in 62 percent of extremely sick patients. Optimism from a potential vaccine and the success of remdesivir also resulted in spike in the US stock market. Abridged. The CEO of the German company BioNTech told The Hill that he expects the coronavirus vaccine the company is developing in partnership with Pfizer to be ready for approval by December. BioNTech CEO Ugur Sahin said several hundred million doses could be produced even before approval and up to 1.2…