💊 Intas Pharmaceuticals' trouble with the FDA; Aspen's Latin American affair; Emergent BioSolutions' Ebola treatment contract

#397 | Age? Covid? Or Alzheimer’s?; What’s going on inside your teenager’s mind?; Tinder for protein-drug matchmaking

Hello, dear reader. Welcome back to another bright, sunny day with The Kable. A bit too sunny for our friends in Iran and South Korea, where the sweltering heat is leading to public holidays and lost lives. All while Beijing witnessed a 140-year high in precipitation since Saturday.

But there’s no time to wallow in climate despair. There is news to be shared.

South Africa’s Aspen Pharmacare is buying the LatAm commercial rights and IP of a portfolio of Viatris drugs for $280 million.

In Kenya, four civil society groups are drawing attention to the resurgence of addictive nicotine products which had been banned by the Ministry of Health two years ago.

In Bangladesh, the dengue outbreak has reached concerning levels, but the peak season is not even here yet. Experts worry the current outbreak may stick around till November.

At the recent Indonesia-China Healthcare and Biotech Investment Forum, Indonesia’s Ministry of Health and China’s Tsinghua University inked a strategic cooperation agreement, while companies from the two countries signed partnership agreements to support the coordinated development of healthcare.

Emergent BioSolutions has bagged a 10-year, $704 million contract from the US Department of Health and Human Services’ BARDA to develop and scale up production of the Ebola treatment Ebanga. The contract also covers tech transfer as part of the manufacturing scale-up, submission of a supplemental BLA to the FDA, and completion of stability studies.

In Big Pharma updates, Roche subsidiary Genentech is suing Novartis’ Sandoz for infringing one of its lung disease drug patents.

As Pfizer’s Covid vaccine and antiviral treatment sales fall below expectations, the company is considering a cost-cutting programme later this year if the downward trend continues. In its update for Q2 of 2023, Pfizer also announced that it is cutting some of its programmes, including a mid-stage pneumococcal vaccine candidate, an early-stage RSV candidate it acquired with ReViral, and some sickle cell and cancer programmes.

And finally, in bird flu updates, Finland’s food authority has ordered the culling of 50,000 mink and foxes at three flu-hit fur farms.