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In a first for the U.S., the FDA has authorized the use of Pfizer's BioNTech-partnered COVID-19 vaccine for use in adolescents between the ages of 12 and 15—months ahead of the upcoming school year in the fall...The FDA will amend the existing emergency authorization for the vaccine, which was first issued in December, the agency said. Pfizer’s vaccine is currently the only shot allowed in the U.S. for Americans as young as the age 16. The vaccine's two-dose regimen will be the same for adolescents as it is for adults, the agency said...READ MORE

Denmark...removed the single-dose Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 shot from its vaccination program to investigate reports of rare but potentially dangerous blood clots...Denmark, which has been very cautious with all vaccines, has already taken the AstraZeneca shot out of its vaccination program for the same reason. Both the J&J and AstraZeneca shots are made with similar technology...The Danish Health Authority said in a statement that it “has concluded that the benefits of using the COVID-19 vaccine from Johnson & Johnson do not outweigh the risk of causing the possible adverse effect.”...READ MORE

Work-at-home arrangements created to respond to the COVID-19 pandemic have forced numerous companies in most sectors to reevaluate their work deals. This has also resulted in rethinking site locations and real estate needs. Here’s a look...READ MORE

• Sanofi Closing Pennsylvania Plant, Laying Of 75
• Pfizer, Novartis and Moderna Studying Onsite/At-Home Work Arrangements
• Switzerland’s Lonza Recruiting Nestle Workers

The European Commission said on Monday it had launched legal action against AstraZeneca for not respecting its contract for the supply of COVID-19 vaccines and for not having a "reliable" plan to ensure timely deliveries...Under the contract, the Anglo-Swedish company had committed to making its "best reasonable efforts" to deliver 180 million vaccine doses to the EU in the second quarter of this year, for a total of 300 million in the period from December to June...But AstraZeneca said in a statement on March 12 it would aim to deliver only one-third of that by the end of June, of which about 70 million would be in the second quarter. A week after that, the Commission sent a legal letter to the company in the first step of a formal procedure to resolve disputes...Read More

In the first three months of 2021, Pfizer's COVID-19 vaccine pulled in as much revenue as some pharma blockbusters make in an entire year. That’s just the beginning, as Pfizer eyes sales from more than a billion additional doses before the end of 2021...The mRNA-based shot Comirnaty—first to market in the U.S.—reeled in $3.5 billion globally in the first quarter...For the full year, Pfizer projects a whopping $26 billion in Comirnaty sales, based on the 1.6 million doses the company has pledged worldwide...READ MORE

The American Federation of Teachers successfully lobbied the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to change its guidance on school reopenings, emails show...As the CDC was preparing to issue guidance that it was safe to reopen schools fully in February, emails obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request revealed that the AFT was behind the scenes, lobbying the agency and the Biden administration to adjust the guidance to make it friendlier to school closures and hybrid learning...The CDC was preparing to update its guidance to reflect its belief that schools could fully reopen, regardless of community spread of COVID-19...READ MORE

Drugmakers who seized the opportunity to develop vaccines against the coronavirus are on their way to reaping significant revenues...In its annual forecast for global drug spending, the IQVIA Institute for Human Data Science put the figure at $157 billion through 2025...In regard to global COVID-19 vaccine spending, IQVIA projects roughly $53 billion this year and $51 billion in 2022. The group sees a precipitous drop in total spending in 2023, to roughly $23 billion...READ MORE

Quality control problems have already plagued one COVID-19 vaccine manufacturer in Baltimore, Maryland. Now, it appears they’re threatening to trip up a major pandemic therapeutic supplier as well...Eli Lilly employees have accused an executive at the drugmaker’s Branchburg...manufacturing site of altering FDA-required documents in an effort to downplay serious quality control problems...citing internal complaint documents...The complaint, dated April 8, said the executive tasked with quality controls rewrote findings from Lilly’s technical experts at the facility, which produces doses of the company’s COVID-19 antibody treatment bamlanivimab, in order to make them look more favorable...READ MORE

Britain’s medicine regulator on...said there had been a further 41 reports of rare blood clots after doses of AstraZeneca’s COVID-19 vaccine, but that the benefits of the shot continued to outweigh the risks for the majority of people...In a weekly update on side effects from COVID-19 vaccines, the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency said there were a total of 209 clots with low platelet counts following vaccination with AstraZeneca's shot, compared to a total of 168 reported last week...READ MORE

The United States is sending supplies worth more than $100 million to India to help it fight a surge of COVID-19 cases...The supplies...include 1,000 oxygen cylinders, 15 million N95 masks and 1 million rapid diagnostic tests...The United States also has redirected its own order of AstraZeneca manufacturing supplies to India, which will allow it to make over 20 million doses of COVID-19 vaccine...READ MORE