The Trump administration confirmed it's reviewing whether to pull $590 million in funding that Moderna received in the final days of the Biden administration to develop an mRNA vaccine for bird fluin people.
The big picture: Moderna shares were trading down 5% Thursday morning on news of the review, part of a bigger examination of spending on messenger RNA-based vaccines based on the same technology used in COVID-19 shots, per Bloomberg.
The Trump administration's federal workforce purge may be jeopardizing VA research into suicide prevention, opioid addiction, prosthetics, cancer and other matters.
The big picture: The administration is refusing to extend VA researchers' three-year "Not to Exceed" term limits as is customary, and is instead dismissing staff, according to Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.).
Providers, patients and digital health companies are ramping up their calls for more certainty that Medicare will continue to reimburse them for telehealth appointments after the current authority to do so expires on April 1.
Why it matters: Telehealth usage among seniors has declined since the worst of the COVID-19 pandemic, but more than 1 in 10 traditional Medicare beneficiaries still used virtual care services in 2023, per KFF. Telehealth can connect patients to medical specialists in other parts of the country, cut down on travel time to appointments and foster independence.
Last week, President Trump threatened tariffs on pharmaceuticals if manufacturers don't relocate operations to the U.S. On Wednesday, the CEO of Eli Lilly stood with Trump's commerce secretary in Washington, D.C., to announce a $27 billion plan to build four manufacturing "mega-sites" in the U.S.
Why it matters: The commitment illustrates the dance much of Big Pharma is engaged in as it tries to make inroads with a new administration bent on reshoring business activity and reducing dependence on China.
The price of eggs is expected to rise by 41.1% this year as the bird flu continues to rip through the nation's agricultural economy, the federal government projected in a new report.
Why it matters: That's more than double the 20% increase predicted in January.
A West Texas city reported Wednesday that an unvaccinated child with measles died after being hospitalized amid the recent outbreak.
The big picture: It's the first death officials have reported in the outbreak that began late last month. At least 124 people have been infected in the state so far.
Eli Lilly and Co. said Wednesday it will open four new U.S. manufacturing "mega sites" in the next five years, in a bid to reduce its reliance on overseas suppliers and take more control over its supply chain.
Why it matters: The "reshoring" comes amid the Trump administration's push to move more manufacturing inside U.S. borders and will create 3,000 jobs, as well as 10,000 construction jobs, Lilly said.
OrganOx, a British developer of technologies to maintain organs for transplant, raised $142m in primary and secondary funding led by HealthQuest Capital.
Why it matters: OrganOx says that its solution — which has approval in the U.S. and Europe — can preserve donor livers for up to 24 hours, or around double the preservation time of traditional cold storage.
A new type of bone marrow transplant can cure sickle cell disease with only half of the donor's cell proteins matching, according to new clinical trial results published in the New England Journal of Medicine.
Why it matters: The procedure would greatly expand the pool of potential donors, in addition to costing less than one-quarter of the price of innovative gene therapies for the condition that have earned Food and Drug Administration approval in recent years.
As the battle over Elon Musk's DOGE-directed cuts to federal medical research continues, institutions already are freezing hiring, cutting back on the number of Ph.D. students they'll accept and making other contingencies.
Why it matters: Capping how much the National Institutes of Health covers the schools' overhead costs could lead to billions of dollars in cuts to scientific research funding and widespread economic fallout.
