Will Trump's executive order enable pharma bribery?

President Trump's executive order pausing enforcement of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, or FCPA, is raising concerns that drugmakers might interpret the move as a signal to resume bribery to boost sales abroad. Over the course of a decade, 10 of the world's biggest pharmaceutical players paid a combined $1.34 billion in fines to the U.S. government for bribing foreign officials.

"The initial view is that U.S. corporations might engage in more corrupt practices, more bribery," one Duke law professor told STAT's Ed Silverman. "To some extent, the executive order may, if not encourage that sort of activity, could be seen as an open door."

RESEARCH

Deep-seated concerns of academic brain drain

Trump administration policies are battering federal health agencies and prompting fears of an exodus of biomedical talent in academia. Cuts to NIH overhead payments, disruptions to grant funding, and restrictions on diversity programs are alarming some scientists — and threatening the U.S.'s longstanding leadership in biomedical research, STAT's Angus Chen and Jonathan Wosen report.

The fear is that these changes will spook young academics and drive them toward industry, or even prompt them to relocate to China or Europe. The new political climate is particularly jarring to scientists who are early in their careers and worry that weakened institutional support could slow innovation and medical breakthroughs, and ultimately harm public health.

"There's a fire sale on American academics now," said Carl Bergstrom, a biology professor at the University of Washington.

artificial intelligence

DeepMind vet launches AI drug discovery company

Simon Kohl, a former DeepMind researcher and part of the 2024 Nobel-winning AlphaFold team, has founded a new company called Latent Labs to focus on AI-driven protein design.

The company's business model is meant to create AI tools for external use, forming strategic partnerships instead of bringing drugs to market in-house, STAT's Brittany Trang reports.

Latent's AI works on proteins, RNA, DNA, and small molecules, optimizing molecular interactions for drug discovery while avoiding long-term pharmaceutical commitments.

glp-1 drugs

Small GLP-1 study shows reduction in alcohol consumption

The ubiquitous, blockbuster GLP-1 drugs may help reduce alcohol consumptions in people with alcohol use disorder, a small, government-funded study in JAMA Psychiatry says.

Of the 48 overweight adults tested, nearly 40% taking semaglutide — the active ingredient in Wegovy and Ozempic — reported no heavy drinking days compared to 20% in the placebo group. Participants given the drug also drank about half as much in a controlled lab setting.

While promising, experts warn that larger studies are necessary to confirm these effects. Early studies also show that GLP-1 drugs can help with smoking cessation and other addictions, underscoring this class of drug's potential in substance use disorders.

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