NIH Issues Grants for Gonorrhea Vaccine and Population Health Research
The NIH recently released two grants valued at almost $70 million to create a gonorrhea vaccine and an improved population health system.
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By - Funding from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) is headed to Intravacc and Mount Sinai to help those organizations improve healthcare in the United States. Using nearly $15 million in grant money, Intravacc plans to develop a gonorrhea vaccine that could help deal with antibiotic-resistant strains of the bacterial infection. And Mount Sinai plans to use its $55 million to expand clinical research into population health and translational research informatics.
VA Senator Says Meta Poses Health Data Privacy Risk
Senator Mark R. Warner penned a public letter to Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg expressing concerns about the company’s Meta pixel tracking tool. The Democrat from Virginia noted that Meta’s pixel tool had now been installed on hundreds of hospital websites, leading to privacy challenges with the transmission of protected health information.
“I am troubled by the recent revelation that the Meta Pixel was installed on a number of hospital websites – including password-protected patient portals – and sending sensitive health information to Meta when a patient scheduled an appointment online,” Warner wrote in the letter. READ MORE.
Novartis’s Legal Battle Against MS Generic
This month, the US Supreme Court decided to allow the sale of generic versions of Novartis’s multiple sclerosis drug Gilenya. In a legal battle spanning several years, Novartis has challenged the sale of generic versions of Gilenya by competing pharmaceutical companies, including the Chinese firm HEC Pharm Co. The ruling has financial implications for Novartis, which generated $2.8 billion in revenue last year from Gilenya sales alone. Novartis has publicly opposed the order and will continue to seek legal solutions. READ MORE.
NIH Issues Grant for Gonorrhea Vaccine
Biotech company Intravacc will use a new $14.6 million NIH grant to develop a vaccine for gonorrhea. Intravacc has already completed a proof-of-concept that yielded a satisfactory safety profile and long-lasting immune response in animals. The company will use a proprietary outer membrane vesicle platform to create the vaccine, which will be administered intranasally. Gonorrhea is usually treated with antibiotics, but recent variations of the Neisseria gonorrhoeae bacteria have been found to be antibiotic-resistant, prompting demand for preventive treatments. READ MORE.
NIH Grant for Population Health Research
The Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai received a $55.5 million grant from the NIH to support ongoing work that uses translational research informatics to improve population health outcomes. Mount Sinai will use the grant to build on work done by ConduITS, its program focused on using digital health and data science to advance clinical research.
“With this grant, we will be able to expand that infrastructure to, for example, continue building our integrated informatics ecosystem to facilitate big-data science across the network and enhance accessibility to data streams needed for researchers who are tackling society’s most pressing and complex health-related challenges such as health inequities, thus creating the potential to improve outcomes for all across our diverse patient populations,” said Rosalind J. Wright, MD, director of ConduITS. READ MORE.
CMS Increases Oversight of Low-Performing Nursing Homes
CMS is changing the way it deals with underperforming nursing homes. Low-performing nursing homes in the Special Focus Facility program must demonstrate systemic quality improvements and pass two consecutive inspections to exit the program. Facilities also risk losing federal funding or being terminated from Medicare and Medicaid if they receive Immediate Jeopardy deficiencies on two surveys. Upon leaving the program, facilities will be monitored for at least three years. READ MORE.
