 | FRI, FEB 28, 2020 | | | | Coronavirus mushrooms outside China | Drugmaker plans critical clinical trial | | | | Think a friend or colleague should be getting this newsletter? Share this link with them to sign up.
World health officials are turning their attention outside China, where businesses have begun to reopen operations and the growth in COVID-19 cases have slowed in recent days. As of Thursday, health officials have confirmed 3,474 cases across 44 countries outside China — up from 505 cases across 24 countries just two weeks earlier. The U.S. is now stepping up its call for the public to start preparing for a possible pandemic outbreak. We have the latest, and what's to come, from our team below.
We'll be exploring more market-shifting news and the groundbreaking innovations in health care that are changing the game live at our Healthy Returns Summit in New York City on May 12. Click here to learn more and get your ticket.
| | Gilead plans coronavirus trial; Moderna, Vir soar as cases mount | After the World Health Organization concluded Gilead's experimental antiviral, remdesivir, is the only drug that appears to have activity against the novel coronavirus, the biotech giant said it's planning to run two late-stage clinical trials of 1,000 patients. Those are in addition to trials currently being run in China and one by the U.S. government. Results from the China trials are expected in April. Meanwhile, shares of Moderna and Vir Biotechnology skyrocketed this week – Moderna's on news it had shipped the first batch of vaccine to the National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Diseases to start a human trial, and Vir's as investors homed in on the company's efforts to develop new treatments for COVID-19. Analysts, however, urged caution in the face of soaring stock prices; Baird on Thursday downgraded Vir's shares to underperform, saying the company is "nowhere close to an effective therapeutic for COVID-19," and that it's "unreasonable to simply cede over $1.7 billion in valuation for a disease market which might not exist by the time a drug lacking even preclinical proof of concept moves through clinical development."
-Meg Tirrell | | | | Health insurers see worst weekly loss in two decades | President Donald Trump has tried to paint this week's market sell-off as a reaction to the Democratic presidential race. When it comes to the rout in health-care stocks, he may have a point. Analysts say the inevitable spread of the coronavirus in the U.S. presents uncertainty for the health sector. But, the rise of Bernie Sanders — who has vowed to end private health insurance — presents more of an existential threat.
-Bertha Coombs | | | | 'Confusion breeds distrust:' China keeps changing how it counts coronavirus cases | New cases of the deadly coronavirus that's run through China surged at the start of February, then leveled off, then jumped by more than 19,000 in over 24 hours. But those swings might not have as much to do with the reality on the ground as they do how Chinese authorities define a "confirmed case." Chinese health officials have revised national guidelines on responding to the COVID-19 outbreak at least six times since Jan. 22. While revising diagnostic methodology makes sense when tracing a rapidly evolving outbreak, China has lost a lot of credibility and faith in the accuracy of its data with its swift and frequent changes, international researchers say.
-Will Feuer | | | | Failure to prepare could be 'fatal,' WHO warns as cases outside China grow | The World Health Organization is warning member countries that failing to prepare for COVID-19 "could be a fatal mistake" after the number of new cases outside of China exceeded those inside for the first time. In the U.S., California health officials said Thursday that 33 people have tested positive for COVID-19 and the state is monitoring at least 8,400 others. A day earlier, U.S. health officials confirmed the first possible community transmission of the coronavirus in a Solano County resident. The case was significant because it means that it's also possible the infection is spreading untraced throughout the local community. The emergence of community transmission in U.S. and the spike in cases in places such as Iran and Italy appear to be confirming a long-running concern from infectious disease experts and scientists: That the virus is spreading too quickly and may be past the point of containment.
-Berkeley Lovelace Jr. | | Healthy Returns: Investing in health care innovation
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