The FDA announced today that it is allowing undiluted, frozen vials of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine to be transported and stored for up to two weeks at conventional temperatures commonly found in pharmaceutical freezers. The decision should allow for wider distribution of the vaccine to sites that do not have ultra-low temperature freezers. Get the […]
Distribution
7 takeaways from Biden’s ‘full-scale, wartime’ plan to combat the COVID-19 pandemic
President Joe Biden kept to his word to announce plans to “establish clear federal leadership” to tackle the coronavirus pandemic on his first full day in office. The White House issued a 200-page document on Wednesday, detailing “full-scale, wartime” plans to harness the nation’s manufacturing and distribution capabilities to boost vaccine production, end shortages of […]
Biden’s COVID-19 response will make manufacturers busy
Manufacturers of vaccine supplies and personal protective equipment can expect more work as the new Biden administration rolls out its plans to combat the COVID-19 pandemic. In one of his first official acts as president, Joe Biden announced a plan to “fully use” the Defense Production Act to ramp up production of testing supplies, masks, […]
Smith+Nephew sees Movemedical automating inventory for its sales people
Smith+Nephew (NYSE:SNN) announced today that it has successfully introduced a new field sales operations and inventory automation system in the U.S. in partnership with Movemedical. The new system is meant to help field sales reps better manage their daily inventory operations — and better serve surgeons’ needs — boosting automation and transparency. Real-time data will […]
HHS to supply vulnerable populations with 30M more Abbott rapid antigen tests
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services announced it will purchase an additional 30 million Abbott (NYSE:ABT) BinaxNOW tests for a variety of groups vulnerable to COVID-19. Recipients will include nursing homes, assisted living facilities, home healthcare, hospice organizations, historically black colleges and universities, Native American tribes and other vulnerable groups, the agency announced. The […]
PPE makers want revamp of pandemic planning and supply distribution
Personal protective equipment manufacturers are asking the federal government to beef up its planning for and management of future pandemics to avoid the shortages that have endangered healthcare workers during COVID-19. Representatives of the International Safety Equipment Association (ISEA), which includes the major manufacturers of N95 masks, told reporters today that they plan to ask the federal […]
U.S. plans to ship 6.4M COVID-19 vaccine doses to states in mid-December
About 6.4 million doses of the COVID-19 vaccine from Pfizer (NYSE:PFE) and its partner BioNTech (NSDQ:BNTX) will ship to U.S. states in mid-December, as long as the vaccine soon receives an FDA EUA. There are also plans to quickly distribute vaccine from rival COVID-19 vaccine developer Moderna (NSDQ:MRNA), which could soon apply for an EUA, officials at the federal […]
Poll: Nearly half of medtech women executives’ companies ready for pandemic’s second wave
Nearly half of medtech executives polled in a recent survey said their companies are prepared for the second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic that is sweeping the globe. Forty-eight percent of the 71 MedExecWomen Fall Forum attendees who responded to the question reported their companies’ readiness hinged on scalable remote commercial capabilities, a bolstered supply chain […]
J&J exec denies pressure to rush COVID-19 vaccine
Johnson & Johnson’s (NYSE:JNJ) chief scientific officer said today that the first doses of his company’s COVID-19 vaccine could be available for frontline healthcare workers in January or February, but added the company isn’t rushing it. If granted an emergency use authorization by the FDA, that’s the earliest Dr. Paul Stoffels said the single-dose vaccine developed […]
J&J exec denies pressure to rush COVID-19 vaccine
Johnson & Johnson’s (NYSE:JNJ) chief scientific officer said today that the first doses of his company’s COVID-19 vaccine could be available for frontline healthcare workers in January or February, but added the company isn’t rushing it. If granted an emergency use authorization by the FDA, that’s the earliest Dr. Paul Stoffels said the single-dose vaccine developed […]
How much could Operation Warp Speed change pharma, medtech distribution?
A top U.S. Department of Health and Human Services official used an appearance today at a virtual medtech conference to repeat the U.S. government’s astounding goal for its Operation Warp Speed program: start delivering 300 million doses of a safe, effective COVID-19 vaccine by January 2021. The project could revolutionize not only how pharmaceuticals are […]
