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.

Moderna

Moderna is still fending off patent challenges over the lipid nanoparticle delivery system used in the company’s COVID-19 vaccine, Spikevax.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration indirectly refuted Pfizer’s recommendation that it’s all right for COVID-19 patients to take another round of Paxlovid if they experience a rebound after completing the first course.

Gilead

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved Gilead Sciences’ antiviral therapy Veklury (remdesivir) as the first treatment for COVID-19 in young children.

Although research is being conducted on Long COVID or Long COVID-19, whose symptoms continue for weeks and months after initial infection, there are very few ongoing clinical trials on treatments. Anecdotally, there has been what appears to be a successful treatment for Long Covid using Pfizer’s antiviral regimen Paxlovid.

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.

Top U.S. infectious disease official Dr. Anthony Fauci said on March 22 he would not be surprised to see an increase in COVID-19 cases in the United States, but he does not expect a major surge.

Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla raked in $24.3 million in total compensation in 2021. In other news, tinnitus (ringing or buzzing in one or both ears) might be a side effect of COVID-19 vaccines.

While Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech have submitted Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) requests for their COVID-19 vaccines, the data so far suggest the benefits of a fourth shot may be modest.

Pfizer Inc. and the company’s German partner BioNTech SE on March 15 filed an application with U.S. regulators seeking emergency use authorization for a second booster shot of their COVID-19 vaccine for people aged 65 and older.