covid

Pharmafile.com’s weekly COVID-19 news round-up

pharmafile | May 20, 2020 | News story | Business Services, Manufacturing and Production, Medical Communications, Research and Development, Sales and Marketing COVID-19, Trump, coronavirus 

Trump continues to play a key role in the unfolding COVID-19 pandemic, with the US currently coping with the largest death toll from the virus worldwide. In the last week he announced a government programme to deliver a working vaccine in record time, before later announcing that he is currently taking the controversial and unproven malaria drug hydroxychloroquine to avoid infection.

Elsewhere, more becomes known about the virus as NHS data revealed that 26% of all English COVID-19 deaths were in diabetics, while the one of the most promising vaccines currently in development, a BARDA-backed candidate from Moderna, revealed very early, tentative successes in human trials.

1. Trump claims he is taking hydroxychloroquine to prevent contracting COVID-19Published on 19/05/20

President Donald Trump told reporters last night that he is taking the controversial malaria drug hydroxychloroquine to ward off COVID-19, despite US health officials warning the drug may be unsafe.

2. Interim data for Moderna’s COVID-19 vaccine shows glimmers of hopePublished on 19/05/20

Biotech firm Moderna has unveiled interim data from its Phase 1 trial of mRNA-1273, its vaccine against SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, observing  dose-dependent increases in patient immunogenicity.

3. Trump announces ‘Operation Warp Speed’ to develop a COVID-19 vaccine by the end of the yearPublished on 18/05/20

President Trump has announced ascientific, industrial, and logistical endeavor unlike anything our country has seen since the Manhattan Project” to develop an effective COVID-19 vaccine for the US.

4. Sanofi backtracks on promise of shipping COVID-19 vaccine to the US firstPublished on 18/05/20

Sanofi has backtracked on earlier comments in which the company’s CEO said the US would get priority when they had successfully developed their coronavirus vaccine candidate.

5. A quarter of English COVID-19 deaths in hospitals were diabeticsPublished on 15/05/20

The NHS’s first data breakdown of underlying health conditions in COVID-19 fatalities has shown that 26% of deaths in hospitals in England occurred in diabetics, accounting for 5,873 deaths between 31 March and 12 May.

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