Otsuka Pharmaceutical entered a multi-target partnership with ShapeTX for more than $1.5 billion. The partnership will focus on the development of new adeno-associated viruses (AAV) gene therapies to treat ocular diseases.(Endpoints News)
Novartis’ research and development hub has a new name and guiding strategy. The hub, which is headquartered in Cambridge, Mass., and for years has been known as Novartis Institutes for BioMedical Research, or NIBR, will soon simply be known as Novartis BioMedical Research. (STAT News)
Eli Lilly’s diabetes drug Mounjaro received approval from the U.K.’s cost-effectiveness watchdog. Making Mounjaro available in the U.K. would offer an alternative to Novo Nordisk’s Ozempic. (Reuters)
Philips Respironics agreed to pay $479 million to settle claims of flawed CPAP machines. Concerns over the breathing machines, which may “spew” gasses and foam flecks into patients’ airways, drove a recall of millions of the devices. (The New York Times)
NPR and KFF Health News shared the story of two health heroes who helped stop smallpox. In Bangladesh, a country packed with people and crisscrossed by rivers, squashing the virus required tactics specific to each local community: its needs, its culture, its worries and terrain. (KFF Health News)
