Author: Peter

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services is reducing insulin copays for seniors who are eligible for Medicare via an executive order from President Donald Trump...Participating enhanced Medicare Part D plans in 2021 will provide a broad set of insulins at a maximum $35 copay for a month’s supply of each type of insulin, the White House said in a fact sheet on the new initiative...CMS estimates that beneficiaries could save $446, or 66%, a year for their insulins, the agency said in a press release...READ MORE

Heavy hearts soared Monday with news that Moderna’s Covid-19 vaccine candidate — the frontrunner in the American market — seemed to be generating an immune response in Phase 1 trial subjects…But was there good reason for so much enthusiasm?...based on the information made available...there’s really no way to know how impressive — or not — the vaccine may be...While Moderna blitzed the media, it revealed very little information — and most of what it did disclose were words, not data...Even the figures the company did release don’t mean much on their own, because critical information — effectively the key to interpreting them — was withheld...Experts suggest we ought to take the early readout with a big grain of salt...READ MORE

Months after FDA said it was investigating the carcinogenic ingredient N-Nitrosodimethylamine (NDMA) in metformin products, the agency’s testing has found elevated levels of NDMA (N-Nitrosodimethylamine) in extended release (ER) metformin but not in the immediate release (IR) formulation...FDA is contacting companies with ER metformin above the acceptable level and will continue to take quick and appropriate action...READ MORE

One drug that has shown promise for treating COVID-19 is remdesivir, an experimental antiviral product...The drug that buoyed expectations for a coronavirus treatment and drew international attention for Gilead Sciences, remdesivir, started as a reject, an also-ran in the search for antiviral drugs. Its path to relevance did not begin until Robert Jordan cleared it…To make progress, Gilead needed help from U.S. taxpayers. Lots of help. Three federal health agencies were deeply involved in remdesivir's development every step of the way, providing tens of millions of dollars of government research support. Now that big government role has set up a political showdown over pricing and access...federal agencies have not asserted patent rights to Gilead's drug, potentially a blockbuster therapy worth billions of dollars. That means Gilead will have few constraints other than political pressure when it sets a price in coming weeks..."Without direct public investment and tax subsidies, this drug would apparently have remained in the scrap heap of unsuccessful drugs...READ MORE

Evans (Lauran Evans, a recent graduate of the University Nevada, Reno’s School of Medicine) was the first medical student at the university to volunteer as a swabber at the district site at the Reno-Livestock Events Center...She started helping out in March after the university canceled in-person classes...About 70 medical students are now volunteering as testers, babysitters and phone bankers through the Washoe County Health District, Reno’s Emergency Medical Services Authority and other providers...READ MORE

The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warned this week that some coronavirus antibody tests are inaccurate and cautioned that even the better tests should not be used to determine who can safely return to work or school...“Suffice to say, CDC is adequately worried about all the junk (antibody) tests that FDA let out on the market,” Mark Pandori, the director of Nevada State Public Health Laboratory, said...The CDC’s guidance comes at a time when public health agencies in Nevada are ramping up to offer the antibody tests to the public...READ MORE

CVS Health will try delivering prescriptions with self-driving vehicles in a test that begins next month...The drugstore chain said...that it will partner with the Silicon Valley robotics company Nuro to deliver medicines and other products to customers near a Houston-area store...A CVS spokesman said the prescriptions will routinely be delivered within an hour of being ordered...Nuro has previously started partnerships to test the delivery of pizzas for Domino’s or groceries for Kroger, also in the Houston area. This is the company’s first venture into health care...READ MORE

After the FDA identified a likely carcinogen in samples of the broadly used diabetes med metformin, recalls appeared likely. Now it's official...The FDA said Thursday it had asked five metformin manufacturers to pull their extended-release metformin products, after pushing recalls of heartburn med Zantac and "sartan" blood pressure drugs for the same reason. A likely human carcinogen, N-Nitrosodimethylamine, was discovered in samples of all three...READ MORE

The United States will end its relationship with the World Health Organization over the body’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic, U.S. President Donald Trump said on Friday, accusing the U.N. agency of becoming a puppet of China...The move to quit the Geneva-based body, which the United States formally joined in 1948, comes amid growing tensions between Washington and Beijing over the coronavirus outbreak...Speaking in the White House Rose Garden, Trump said Chinese officials “ignored their reporting obligations” to the WHO about the virus - that has killed hundreds of thousands of people globally - and pressured the agency to “mislead the world.”...READ MORE

Requiring patients to visit a hospital, clinic or medical office to get an abortion pill is needlessly risking their health during the COVID-19 pandemic, a group of physicians allege in a lawsuit that seeks to suspend the federal rule...The federal lawsuit, which the American Civil Liberties Union filed...in Maryland, questions why patients can’t fill a prescription for mifepristone by mail. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved mifepristone to be used in combination with a second drug, misoprostol, to end an early pregnancy or manage a miscarriage...“Of the more than 20,000 drugs regulated by the FDA, mifepristone is the only one that patients must receive in person at a hospital, clinic, or medical office, yet may self-administer, unsupervised, at a location of their choosing,” the lawsuit says...READ MORE