| | | |   | Hullo, it's Meghana. Lots of global health issues on tap today, as well as an intriguing off-the-shelf cancer vaccine that could curb metastases. In mice. | | | Pfizer offering lower prices to lower-income countries Pfizer plans on providing nearly two dozen of its patent-protected medicines and vaccines at not-for-profit prices to 45 developing countries. Pfizer will ship products like its Covid-19 vaccine and antiviral pill to Rwanda, Ghana, Malawi, Senegal, and Uganda later this year. The initiative will eventually include 27 low-income countries and 18 lower-middle-income countries, most of which are in Africa. Others include Haiti, Bangladesh, and Tajikistan. The patented medical products are meant to treat infectious disease, cancers, and rare and inflammatory diseases. As Pfizer launches new products, they’ll also be added into the program at prices substantially lower than Pfizer charges elsewhere. “This groundbreaking initiative aims to reduce health inequities that exist between many lower-income countries and the rest of the world,” CEO Albert Bourla said in a statement. Read more. | An off-the-shelf cancer vaccine works (in mice) A new type of cancer vaccine not only shrank treatment-resistant tumors in mice, but also prevented metastases, a new study in the journal Nature reports. While most cancer vaccines are intentionally bespoke, this one is based on an antibody that could be used universally — and could be mass-produced. It’ll likely be tested in human volunteers next year. Cancer cells often carry alarm molecules on their surfaces — molecular red flags that they are malignant. They’ve evolved to shed these proteins, however, as a way to evade the immune system. The new vaccine works by coaxing the body into making antibodies that stick to alarm proteins on the outside of cancer cells. This prevents the tumors from culling the identifying proteins, allowing immune cells to continue recognizing the cancer. Read more. | Advances in AAV technology create new way forward for gene therapy in CNS diseases Advances in the field of delivering gene therapies to the CNS through improved AAV tropism and efficiency are yielding new technologies that present a promising way to deliver therapeutics safely, and effectively across key regions of the brain. The TRACER™️ AAV capsid screening platform is discovering novel AAV9 and AAV5 variants with desirable characteristics across non-human primates and rodents, which may lead to successful translation into humans. Learn more. | Ethiopia’s oncologists plead for international aid Civil war has been raging in Ethiopia for the past 18 months, which means that critical drugs haven’t been making it into the country. At the main hospital in the country’s embattled Tigray region, only two unexpired chemotherapy drugs remain. That means that most cancer patients there are being treated with expired medication and acetaminophen, the Guardian writes. “We cannot even give them [a] strong analgesic for pain and other palliative treatments. We don’t have strong analgesics like morphine,” one oncologist said. “What we have is mild and moderate analgesics like tramadol and paracetamol. So [the patients] are also suffering from pain.” The WHO hasn’t supplied cancer drugs to the country, since they are controlled substances that can’t be procured by the organization’s partners. Doctors are now imploring cancer societies around the world to help. “We call to the medical community to be a voice for these voiceless patients,” the physician said. | Drug QR codes could help reduce waste Drug packaging is basically earmarked from the start as landfill fodder, and the market for the unnecessary padding is growing 6.4% each year. Discarded paper product packaging accounts for 25% of landfill waste — with drug inserts making a notable, but avoidable, contribution. One way to reduce such paper waste would be with QR codes, opine two consultants. Instead of including lengthy instructions, for example, the packaging could be stamped with a QR code that links to detailed information about the drug — or even to an instructional video. These QR codes could serve a dual purpose, they say — “providing the added benefit of accurately and efficiently collecting first-party consumer data.”
Read more. | More reads - With failed Covid shot still dragging on earnings, CureVac tries to turn page to next-gen mRNA tech. FierceBiotech
- Heart trouble report & clinical hold spell end of Antios, Assembly Bio HBV alliance. MedCity News
- Eli Lilly announces $2.1 billion manufacturing expansion in Indiana. MarketWatch
| | Correction: In yesterday's Readout, we said that Goldman Sachs cut its price target for SpringWorks Therapeutics from $92 to $76. They raised that target to $82. | Thanks for reading! Until tomorrow,  | | | |
No comments