Emerging Infectious Diseases
A bill designed to identify and combat efforts by the Chinese government to exploit the COVID-19 pandemic was introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives.
The Preventing China from Exploiting COVID-19 Act calls upon the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) to investigate how the Chinese... Read More »
A group of House Democratic leaders sent letters to the CEOs of the major social media companies to request information on how they are responding to disinformation related to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The letters were sent to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Google CEO Sundar Pichai, and Twitter CEO... Read More »
Sandia National Laboratories personnel is offering design specifications for an outdoor shelter shielding healthcare workers conducting COVID-19 testing on its licensing and technology transfer website.
The free design and instruction manual would yield a low-cost, drive-up outdoor shelter. The... Read More »
Streamlining processes this week, the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) created a new clinical trials network to gather thousands of volunteers together for testing of various investigational vaccines and monoclonal antibodies for use against COVID-19.
NIAID -- a part... Read More »
A bill that would require a plan for diagnostic testing and public health system integration for COVID-19 and future pandemics was introduced in the U.S. Senate this week.
The bill, the Timely and Effective Systematic Testing (TEST) Act, was introduced by Sens. Cory Gardner (R-CO), Michael... Read More »
Pressing forward with a potential antibody treatment for COVID-19 known as REGN-COV2, the U.S. Departments of Health and Human Services (HHS) and Defense (DoD) announced an agreement with Regeneron, Inc. this week that will culminate in a commercial-scale manufacturing demonstration.
REGN-COV2... Read More »
Rewards are rolling out from the Trump administration’s Operation Warp Speed this week, including $1.6 billion -- allotted from the Departments of Health and Human Services (HHS) and Defense (DoD) -- given to Novavax, Inc. for 100 million doses of a possible COVID-19 vaccine.
While the... Read More »
A second COVID-19 antigen diagnostic test has been added to the United States arsenal this week, under an emergency use authorization (EUA) issued by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for the Becton Dickinson (BD) Veritor System.
“Expanding America’s testing capabilities is the... Read More »
A new partnership for the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority’s (BARDA) ongoing efforts to grapple with COVID-19 has united it with Chembio Diagnostics, Inc. in an attempt to create a point-of-care in vitro diagnostic test.
If successful, that test would be capable of... Read More »
Emergent BioSolutions Inc. struck a five-year manufacturing services agreement with Johnson & Johnson's Janssen Pharmaceuticals Inc. for its investigational COVID-19 vaccine.
Emergent will provide contract development and manufacturing (CDMO) services for large-scale drug substance... Read More »
U.S. Reps. Max Rose (D-NY) Kendra Horn (D-OK), and Stephanie Murphy (D-FL) introduced legislation requiring the U.S. government to combat efforts by the Chinese government to exploit the COVID-19 pandemic.
The Preventing China from Exploiting COVID-19 Act requires the Director of National... Read More »
Expanding on an existing partnership, the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA) and Sonica Health announced last week that they will work together to create a wearable patch capable of monitoring for COVID-19 infections.
The device is meant for high-risk clinical... Read More »
The Homeland Security Committee has released a report assessing the government’s coronavirus oversight response, detailing the Committee’s actions amid the pandemic.
Rep. Bennie G. Thompson (D-MS), chairman of the Homeland Security Committee, recently released a majority staff report... Read More »
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is providing licensure guidance for those companies and organizations developing COVID-19 vaccines.
The guidance, called the “Development and Licensure of Vaccines to Prevent COVID-19,” provides an overview of key considerations to satisfy requirements... Read More »
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) struck an agreement to secure large supplies of the drug remdesivir from Gilead Sciences.
HHS has secured more than 500,000 treatment courses of remdesivir -- the first authorized therapeutic for COVID-19 -- for U.S. hospitals through... Read More »
Legislators are not waiting for the coronavirus pandemic to subside to suggest ways to combat future health emergencies.
In his recently released white paper “Preparing for the Next Pandemic,” U.S. Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-TN) outlines five recommendations Congress can act on in the next six... Read More »
A group of U.S. Senators recently called on Senate leadership to include federal funding for HIV/AIDS treatment, prevention, and housing programs in the next coronavirus pandemic response package.
Specifically, the Senators, including Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) and Tammy Baldwin (D-WI), are... Read More »
The Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI) is part of an effort to ensure equitable access to COVID-19 vaccines for all countries.
CEPI helped launch the COVID-19 Vaccine Global Access Facility (COVAX), part of the ACT Accelerator, which was established to ensure that the... Read More »
Scientists did not anticipate the initial threat of SARS-CoV-2, but what if they could have.
In a commentary released this month by Amesh Adalja, a senior scholar at Johns Hopkins University Center for Health Security, society could be prepared for the next pandemic through a medical... Read More »
In accordance with the CARES Act containing a provision for the Government Accountability Office (GAO) to report on ongoing COVID-19 monitoring and oversight efforts, six recommendations have been issued.
The GAO indicated its recent analysis examined key actions the federal government has... Read More »
The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) Ministry of Health declared this week that an Ebola outbreak which has ravaged the eastern portion of the country since 2018 has finally reached its end.
The news was hailed by global and U.S. health officials, still themselves battling the worldwide... Read More »
A new platform, SolaVAX, aims to help inactivate the SARS-CoV-2 virus -- the virus which causes COVID-19 -- in patients, and its progress will be a joint project of its creators at Colorado State University and the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA).
SolaVAX was... Read More »
Pharma company Moderna will collaborate with Catalent – a company that develops technologies and manufacturing solutions for drugs and consumer health products – on Moderna’s mRNA-based COVID-19 vaccine candidate.
Catalent will provide vial filling and packaging capacity, as well as... Read More »
The Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations, or CEPI, signed an agreement with Stevanato Group to supply glass vials to hold vaccine for the COVID-19 virus once it is developed.
Stevanato, based in Italy, will supply 100 million Type 1 Borosilicate glass vials to hold up to 2 billion... Read More »
An existing partnership between vaccine company Sanofi Pasteur and clinical-stage mRNA therapeutics company Translate Bio expanded this week to include development of mRNA vaccines for infectious diseases.
The companies originally began collaborating in 2018. Now, their union will focus on... Read More »
The Trump administration will end federal support for 13 community-based COVID-19 testing sites by the end of the month, as the White House looks to other means of financial support for ongoing efforts.
This will particularly impact Texas, which has seen an explosion of cases in recent days,... Read More »
Clover Biopharmaceuticals began phase 1 clinical trials in Perth, Australia, on its COVID-19 vaccine candidate, which is supported by the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI).
CEPI has provided up to $3.5 million for Clover to support the preparation and initiation of a trial... Read More »
Both INOVIO’s CELLECTRA 3PSP smart device and CELLECTRA 2000 devices will benefit from a $71 million contract with the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD), in the hopes of scaling up DNA delivery devices for the company’s potential COVID-19 vaccine, INO-4800.
Both devices deliver INO-4800... Read More »
A public-private partnership between the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA) and MBio Diagnostics aims to create a COVID-19 serology test capable of providing results within five minutes.
The test is a point-of-care diagnostic that tests for human anti-SARS-CoV-2... Read More »
The Strategic National Stockpile (SNS), which is tasked with supplementing state and local supplies of antibiotics, vaccines and other critical drugs and medical products, woefully needs a revamp to help the nation better prepare and respond to public health emergencies like the current COVID-19... Read More »
U.S. Reps. Frank Pallone, Jr. (D-NJ) and Diana DeGette (D-CO) are seeking answers from Trump Administration officials on how the federal government is overseeing suppliers of personal protective equipment (PPE), testing supplies, and other medical supplies.
The lawmakers cited recent reports... Read More »
Reckoning with the possibility of bad actors taking advantage of a crisis, House members introduced two bills this week to protect patients from price-gouging on taxpayer funded COVID-19 drugs, avoid monopolies, and strengthen oversight of federally invested research and development funds.
The... Read More »
Sandia National Laboratories recently announced that it was working with medical device manufacturers to test mask materials and with local hospitals to evaluate N95 mask cleaning methods to boost the availability of masks in the beleaguered United States healthcare system.
This assistance is... Read More »
A panel of public health experts called on Congress to focus on creating a mechanism that would help create vaccines for future pandemics, even as the world is working to cope with the ongoing COVID-19 crisis.
“This pandemic is a harbinger of things to come,” Julie Gerberding, former... Read More »
In an effort to reduce shortages and the reliance on foreign medical supply chains, the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA) and Department of Defense (DoD) have teamed up with Corning, Inc. to produce more glass tubing and vials quicker.
In particular, the federal... Read More »
