Author: Biotech Express

Peter Marks has been tapped to serve as acting director of the Office of Vaccines Research and Review at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) following the resignation of two top officials at the agency who questioned the Biden administration’s plan for COVID-19 booster shots. Marion Gruber and Philip Krause, who oversaw the FDA’s vaccines authorization division, announced their retirements at the beginning of September. The resignation came a few weeks before the two joined in publishing a paper in The Lancet that argued against evidence supporting the booster shot program. The report said there is insufficient evidence supporting…

According to the study’s co-lead author Dr José Manuel Aburto, ‘For Western European countries such as Spain, England and Wales, Italy, Belgium, among others, the last time such large magnitudes of declines in life expectancy at birth were observed in a single year was during WW-II.’ But, he says, the scale of the life expectancy losses was stark across most countries studied, ‘22 countries included in our study experienced larger losses than half a year in 2020. Females in eight countries and males in 11 countries experienced losses larger than a year. To contextualize, it took on average 5.6 years…

Sterling Accuris, a pathology-focused, diagnostic lab chain, started operations in 2016, and operates around 150 labs and collection centres across Gujarat, Delhi, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh Sterling Accuris Wellness Pvt Ltd has signed an agreement to raise Rs 250 crore ($34 million) of equity funds from a fund managed by Morgan Stanley Private Equity Asia. Veda Corporate Advisors, a mid-market investment bank, advised the company and its promoters on the transaction. Rajiv Sharma, MD and CEO of Sterling Accuris said the investment in Sterling Accuris will enable it to expand the lab network. Morgan Stanley Private Equity Asia is a…

The names of 11 scientists, who received the country’s highest science award Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Prize for science and technology 2021, were announced during the 80th foundation day of the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) on Sunday. The prize is given to Indian scientists below the age of 45 for outstanding research in seven fields—Biology, Chemistry, Environment Science, Engineering, Mathematics, Medicine and Physics. For Biological Sciences, Dr Amit Singh, department of microbiology and cell biology, Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru, and Dr Arun Kumar Shukla, department of biological sciences and bioengineering, Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur, were awarded.…

The 2021 Lasker-DeBakey Clinical Award was awarded to Katalin Karikó, PhD, senior vice president at BioNTech RNA Pharmaceuticals, and Drew Weissman, MD, PhD, professor in vaccine research at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. The pair’s decades of research, and teamwork, pioneered the mRNA technology that led to the COVID-19 vaccines developed by Moderna and BioNTech/Pfizer. The Lasker Awards have been awarded annually since 1945 to living persons who have made major contributions to medical science or who have performed public service on behalf of medicine. They are administered by the Lasker Foundation, founded by Albert…

U.S. drug regulators have asked several pharmaceutical companies to repeat studies conducted at two Indian contract research organizations (CROs) (Synchron Research Services and Panexcell Clinical Lab) on data integrity concerns. US Food and Drug Administration (USFDA) actions include tests at Ahmedabad-based Synchron and Navi Mumbai-based Panexcell facilities, and research data generated by these CROs and submitted in several applications. Inspections and data analysis revealed serious cases of illegal activity and federal regulatory violations, resulting in invalid research data being submitted to the FDA, regulators said in a notice reviewed by the ET.

Mexican prosecutors have asked a federal judge to jail 31 renowned Mexican scientists on charges of organized crime and money laundering, part of a growing dispute between the leftist government and the country’s leading academics and universities. The judge has rejected similar petitions twice, claiming that there has been a lack of sufficient evidence against the individuals. On Wednesday, the government re-filed the petition for the third time. The scientists make up an independent advisory panel to the government’s science council. Prosecutors are claiming that the 31 individuals illegally used $12 million of government money. However, members of the advisory…

Top virologist Dr Gagandeep Kang said on Monday that the coronavirus pandemic in the country may be heading towards endemic stage, adding that a third wave, if it does take place, is likely to be due to local flare-ups that would be smaller and spread wider across the country. “When you have something that is not going away in the near future, then it is heading towards endemicity. Right now, we are not looking at eliminating SARS-CoV-2. This means that the virus has to become endemic,” Dr Kang, who teaches at Vellore’s Christian Medical College, said in an interview with…

U.S.A Senator Rand Paul (R-Ky.) intensified his criticism of Anthony Fauci, claiming that the nation’s top infectious diseases expert lied to Congress about gain of function research in wuhan and should face a five-year prison sentence. The senator has claimed for months that Fauci, lied to Congress about whether the NIH funded gain-of-function research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology. “It’s a felony punishable by five years in jail,” Paul said in an interview with Fox News. “I don’t think Biden Department of Justice will do anything with it, but … it is very dangerous to have public officials who…

Ronald C. Kessler, PhD who is the McNeil Family Professor of Health Care Policy at Harvard Medical School is ranked no.1, he has an h-index>300. From India, Prof Pandey, Biologist, tops the list with an h-index at 107. Professor Pandey is currently Distinguished Scientist at Centre for Innovation and Translational Research, CSIR-Indian Institute of Toxicology Research (IITR), Lucknow, India and Honorary Executive Director at the Centre for Energy and Environmental Sustainability- India. Formerly, he was Eminent Scientist at the Center of Innovative and Applied Bioprocessing (CIAB), Mohali and Chief Scientist & Head of Biotechnology Division at CSIR’s National Institute for…