 | FRI, JAN 31, 2020 | | | | One company receives kickbacks to push opioids on patients; Coronavirus declared a global health crisis | | | | Think a friend or colleague should be getting this newsletter? Share this link with them to sign up.
The World Health Organization officially declared the novel coronavirus a global health emergency, only the sixth time the agency has made such a designation in history. With nearly 10,000 cases, coronavirus has now surpassed the 2003 SARS outbreak in less than a month. We have the latest, and what's to come, from our team below.
Also this week, we take a look at a highly-anticipated, but perhaps disappointing, IPO for a healthcare unicorn. And one firm admits to taking kickbacks to push opioid prescriptions from an unnamed company (but we're pretty sure we know who it is).
There's a lot this week in health care and pharma news. Keep submitting your thoughts if there's something you're curious about to CNBC Health Editor Dawn Kopecki at dawn.kopecki@nbcuni.com.
| | Coronavirus cases near 10K — surpassing 2003 SARS outbreak in less than a month | Global cases of coronavirus this week surpassed the total number of infections over the nine-month SARS outbreak in less than a month. As of Friday morning, the coronavirus has infected nearly 10,000 people around the world. The coronavirus has spread much more quickly than SARS did in 2003. The new virus first emerged in Wuhan, China, on Dec. 31. The deadly SARS virus, by comparison, infected a total of 8,098 people globally from Nov. 1, 2002, through July 31, 2003, according to the WHO. The new coronavirus appears to be less deadly than the 2003 SARS epidemic, which killed 774 people over the nine-month outbreak.
-Will Feuer | | | | WHO declares China coronavirus that's killed more than 200 a global health emergency | The World Health Organization said the fast-spreading coronavirus is a global health emergency, a rare designation that helps the agency mobilize financial and political support to contain the outbreak. The announcement came just hours after the U.S. confirmed its first human-to-human transmission of the virus — the husband of the Chicago woman who traveled to Wuhan. WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus urged the public to remain calm, saying the agency wasn't recommending "measures that unnecessarily interfere with international trade or travel." He said China was doing everything it could to contain the outbreak.
-Berkeley Lovelace Jr. | | | | Ebola success yields confidence for coronavirus drug, vaccine development | As the 2014 Ebola outbreak raged in West Africa, early hopes were pinned on a drug called ZMapp made by a little-known company named Mapp Biopharmaceutical. Vaccine development was largely an academic endeavour . Five years later, the world has changed: facing the fast-spreading novel coronavirus, a dozen drug companies large and small have stepped into the fight, bolstered, many told us this week, by success in Ebola. Regeneron and Vir Biotechnology are developing potential drugs, with a goal of readiness for human testing within a few months. And Johnson & Johnson and Moderna have already announced vaccine development plans . "We may have a vaccine in record time," tweeted former FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb. It will still be months before anything is ready—but it's still a much more promising start.
-Meg Tirrell | | | | Flight carrying US citizens from Wuhan arrives in California, CDC says | A government-chartered flight carrying U.S. citizens evacuated from Wuhan, the epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak, safely arrived in California this week. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said the flight landed at the March Air Reserve Base in Riverside, California. A team of CDC medical officers screened the nearly 200 passengers upon their arrival and determined that none are currently exhibiting symptoms of the coronavirus. The CDC will continue to monitor the passengers, all of whom agreed to stay at the Air Reserve Base for an incubation period. Both the CDC and the State Department have recommended Americans avoid traveling to China amid the outbreak.
-Will Feuer | | | | One Medical IPO signals continued investor caution | As One Medical becomes the first health care unicorn to go public this year, it seems investors remain circumspect about companies with no profits, after some of last year's splashiest IPOs struggled in the market. The primary care firm priced at $14 per share, at the bottom of the expected range, ahead of this morning's debut on the Nasdaq.
-Bertha Coombs | | | | Practice Fusion admits to taking kickbacks to push doctors to prescribe opiates | In the midst of the opiate crisis, one company saw an opportunity. Practice Fusion, a venture-backed company that develops free medical record software, admitted this week to soliciting and receiving kickbacks from a major pharmaceutical company in exchange for influencing physicians to prescribe opiates. Practice Fusion, which is owned by Allscripts, agreed to pay $145 million in fines to resolve the charges. Allscripts said it is committed to the "highest levels of professionalism and integrity," in a statement to CNBC.
-Chrissy Farr | | Healthy Returns: Investing in health care innovation
How innovators and investors are working with patients and providers to develop dynamic new solutions and create healthy returns.
CNBC presents a one-day event that brings together top health care investors, CEOs and technologists to explore the innovations that will drive better outcomes, financially and clinically.
Led by CNBC's anchors and reporters, Healthy Returns hones in on groundbreaking ideas that will transform the health care industry, cutting through the noise and weeding out the "sales pitch." | | Healthy Returns May 12, 2020
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