Top Health News Briefs: From Altitude Sickness Drugs to Bird Flu Outbreaks

This summary covers current health news, including U.S. scrutiny of WuXi AppTec for working with Chinese military scientists on altitude sickness treatments, FDA warnings, bird flu outbreaks, antitrust probes, COVID-19 vaccine recommendations, Nestle's acquisition, Amgen's drug success, ASF in Germany, a bird flu death in Mexico, and generic drug competition in China.

Following is a summary of current health news briefs.

Staff at drugmaker under U.S. scrutiny worked with Chinese military scientists

Employees of drugmaker WuXi AppTec, under U.S. scrutiny for its links to the Chinese military, co-invented altitude sickness treatments with People's Liberation Army (PLA) scientists, according to public patent records and science papers reviewed by Reuters. The news agency identified 10 patent filings that list six of WuXi AppTec's staff as co-inventors of altitude sickness drugs with six scientists from the PLA General Hospital in Beijing - China's top military medical school and research centre. The filings, which Reuters is reporting for the first time, were made in the U.S., Europe and China between 2018 and 2023.

US FDA warns on risks linked to sulfite-containing compounded drugs

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration said on Wednesday it had alerted healthcare professionals, drug compounders and patients about the risk of allergic reactions to sulfite-containing compounded drugs. The FDA said it had received reports of complaints of conjunctivitis or pink eye, itchy eyes, swollen eyelids and

Bird flu reported in Iowa dairy herd, expanding US outbreak in cows

A U.S. outbreak of bird flu in dairy cows expanded to a tenth state as Iowa reported its first infection in a herd on Wednesday. The United States has confirmed cases in more than 80 herds nationwide since late March and three dairy workers have tested positive.

Novartis, Roche unit and others face Italy antitrust probe over eye drug

Italy's antitrust regulator said on Thursday it had launched an investigation into pharmaceutical companies including Novartis and Roche-controlled Genentech for having potentially restricted competition in the sale of an eye drug. Biopharma developer Samsung Bioepis, biotechs Biogen and Genentech, and Novartis, and some of their Italian, Dutch and UK units, allegedly coordinated their commercial strategies to delay the launch in Italy of Byooviz, a drug made with ranibizumab and developed and sold by Samsung Bioepis, the watchdog said in a statement.

COVID shots should target variants with JN.1 lineage in 2024-25 campaign, US FDA advisers say

Advisers to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration on Wednesday unanimously voted in favor of recommending that COVID-19 vaccines for 2024-25 should target a strain within the lineage of the JN.1 variant that has been dominant this year. The 16 advisors did not vote on whether to favor the original JN.1 variant or one of its successors like the currently dominant KP.2 strain.

Nestle's health arm to buy first-ever fecal transplant pill

Nestle Health Science will buy the rights to Seres Therapeutics' Vowst, the companies said on Thursday, gaining access to the first ever pill alternative to fecal transplants for a deadly infection. Nestle's unit will pay an undisclosed payment to Massachusetts-based Seres, and the drug maker will also receive capital infusions, the companies said.

Amgen's drug meets main goal in late-stage study for rare disease

Amgen said on Wednesday its drug helped to reduce the risk of flares in patients with an immune system-related condition, meeting the main goal of a late-stage study. The drug, Uplizna, was being studied for the treatment of Immunoglobulin G4-related disease (IgG4-RD), which is characterized by periods of remission and unpredictable disease flares.

Germany has new African swine fever case in farm pigs, state reports

A case of African swine fever (ASF) has been confirmed in farm pigs in east Germany, authorities said on Thursday. It was confirmed on a pig breeding farm in Greifswald in the eastern state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, the state's agriculture ministry said.

Person with bird flu died in Mexico, WHO says

A person with prior health complications who had contracted bird flu died in Mexico in April and the source of exposure to the virus was unknown, the World Health Organization said on Wednesday. WHO said the current risk of bird flu virus to the general population is low.

Novo Nordisk braces for generic challenge to Ozempic, Wegovy in China

Novo Nordisk is facing the prospect of intensifying competition in the promising Chinese market where drugmakers are developing at least 15 generic versions of its diabetes drug Ozempic and weight loss treatment Wegovy, clinical trial records showed. The Danish drugmaker has high hopes that demand for its blockbuster drugs will surge in China, which is estimated to have the world's highest number of people who are overweight or obese.

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)