The Omicron variant of the coronavirus does not have a negative effect on cardiovascular health in young adults who have been vaccinated, a small study suggests. Additionally, women should not delay routine mammograms after receiving a COVID-19 mRNA vaccine, experts now say.
Regeneron Pharmaceuticals shared positive results from the company’s Phase III trial of a candidate drug for children with homozygous familial hypercholesterolemia (HoFH), a rare, life-threatening condition characterized by elevated circulating levels of low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C) and accelerated, premature atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease (ACVD.
Drugmakers Pfizer Inc and BioNTech SE said on May 23 that three doses of their COVID-19 vaccine generated a strong immune response in children under age 5 and was safe and well-tolerated in their clinical trial.
White House COVID-19 response coordinator Dr. Ashish Jha said on May 22 he expects a U.S. Food and Drug Administration decision on authorizing Moderna’s vaccine for children under age five within the next few weeks.
AbbVie submitted a New Drug Application to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for ABBV-951 (foscarbidopa/foslevodopa) for the treatment of motor fluctuations in patients with advanced Parkinson’s disease.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved Sanofi’s Dupixent (dupilumab) 300 mg weekly to treat patients with eosinophilic esophagitis (EoE) aged 12 years and older, weighing at least 40 kg. With this approval, Dupixent is the first and only medicine specifically indicated to treat EoE in the United States.
With increasing concerns about COVID-19 reinfection, Pfizer and the National Institutes of Health are discussing potential studies regarding a longer treatment period with the antiviral medication Paxlovid.
Reportedly, Pfizer is holding the company’s COVID-19 antiviral therapy Paxlovid under tight control. This is a disappointment to numerous investigators who want to test the antiviral combination therapy with other drugs in case the virus develops resistance to the combo.
In a peer-reviewed study published May 17 in PLOS Medicine, scientists found that mRNA-based COVID-19 vaccines were superior to adenovirus vector-based ones across major variants of the SARS-CoV-2 virus.
Rising COVID-19 cases are driving up the use of therapeutics, with Pfizer Inc.’s oral antiviral treatment Paxlovid seeing a 315 percent jump over the past four weeks, U.S. health officials said on May 17.
Getty Images