Aug 3, 2017

FDA approves AbbVie's new, cheaper hepatitis C drug

Bob Herman

Charles Williams / Flickr Creative Commons

The Food and Drug Administration gave the green light Thursday to Mavyret, a hepatitis C drug made by AbbVie. Mavyret's list price is $26,400 for an eight-week treatment, the most common, and $39,600 for 12 weeks, an AbbVie spokesperson told Axios.

Why it matters: AbbVie's latest hepatitis C drug is a lot cheaper than Harvoni, the dominant hepatitis C medication made by Gilead Sciences. Harvoni retails for about $63,000 for eight weeks, although Gilead gets only about half of that after rebates and discounts. Even still, the lower-cost Mavyret could force pharmacy benefit managers and health insurers to consider putting it on their preferred drug lists in addition to, or instead of, Gilead's drugs.

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Axios

Bloomberg offers to release women from 3 nondisclosure agreements

Mike Bloomberg. Photo: Brett Carlsen/Getty Images

Mike Bloomberg said Friday his company will release three women identified to have signed nondisclosure agreements so they can publicly discuss their allegations against him if they wish.

Why it matters, via Axios' Margaret Talev: Bloomberg’s shift in policy toward NDAs comes as he tries to stanch his loss of female support after the Las Vegas debate. It is an effort to separate the total number of harassment and culture complaints at the large company from those directed at him personally. That could reframe the criticism against him, but also protect the company from legal fallout if all past NDAs were placed in jeopardy.

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Axios

Coronavirus spreads to more countries, and U.S. ups its case count

Data: The Center for Systems Science and Engineering at Johns Hopkins, the CDC, and China's Health Ministry. Note: China numbers are for the mainland only and U.S. numbers include repatriated citizens.

The novel coronavirus continues to spread to more nations, and the U.S. reports a doubling of its confirmed cases to 34 — while noting those are mostly due to repatriated citizens, emphasizing there's no "community spread" yet in the United States.

The big picture: COVID-19 has now killed at least 2,250 people and infected almost 77,000 others, mostly in mainland China. New countries to announce infections recently include Israel, Lebanon and Iran.

Go deeperArrowUpdated 17 mins ago - Health
Eileen Drage O'Reilly

Repatriated American citizens have doubled coronavirus cases in U.S.

Face mask discarded outside the Diamond Princess cruise ship. Photo: Tomohiro Ohsumi/Getty Images

The official number of confirmed cases of the novel coronavirus in the U.S. just doubled — to 34 — but public health officials are pointing out that these are mostly people who've been repatriated.

Why it matters: As concerns grow about a global pandemic, officials from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention want to make sure the message gets out: "We are not seeing community spread here in the United States," Nancy Messonnier says.

Go deeperArrow2 hours ago - Health