Children ages 5 to 11 who received the Pfizer/BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine were 68% less likely to be hospitalized during the Omicron wave in the United States than unvaccinated children, according to a study published on March 30.
Merck announced that the company will lay off 170 people from Cambridge, Massachusetts-based Acceleron Pharma, which was acquired during November 2021 for about $11.5 billion.
Florida reached more than $878 million in settlements with CVS Health Corp. and three drug companies to resolve claims and avert a trial in April over their roles in fueling an opioid epidemic in the third most populous U.S. state.
The U.S. national public health agency said on March 29 that the BA.2 sub-variant of Omicron was estimated to account for more than half the coronavirus variants in the country.
A sub-variant of the highly transmissible Omicron version of coronavirus known as BA.2 is now dominant worldwide, prompting surges in many countries in Europe and Asia and raising concern over the potential for a new wave in the United States.
A year after infection with the coronavirus – when antibodies in the blood are barely detectable – the immune system continues to “remember” the virus and should respond to some extent upon re-encountering it, a study from China suggests. According to new research, women who were pregnant during the recent Omicron surge had more than eight times the rate of COVID-19 diagnoses, but lower odds of severe illness compared with pregnant women diagnosed earlier in the pandemic.
A federal judge in Delaware tossed out a lawsuit by Roche company Genentech accusing Novartis’ Sandoz division of patent infringement. In this case, the patent was related to Genentech’s Esbriet (pirfenidone), which is used to treat idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis.
Bayer AG reached an $80 million settlement with Ohio to resolve environmental damage allegedly caused by polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) made by the company’s Monsanto business, the state attorney general said on March 24.
New York Mayor Eric Adams is set to lift the city’s COVID-19 vaccine mandate for performers and professional athletes as early as this week, Politico reported on March 23, a rule that has come under growing criticism by local sports teams.
The toll of the COVID-19 pandemic was reflected in a natural decrease during 2021 in the population of nearly three-quarters of U.S. counties versus the two previous years, the census bureau said on March 24.
