Canadian pot producer Aphria Inc co-founder and Chief Executive Officer Vic Neufeld is stepping down, at a time the company is facing questions about its deals in Latin America and a recent slump in its shares.
The company also said its marijuana sales nearly doubled in the second quarter driving overall revenue to C$21.7 million ($16.4 million) from C$8.5 million a year earlier, sending its shares up 6 percent.
The stock tumbled about 30 percent on Dec. 3 following a report by short-seller Hindenburg Research, which alleged the company had diverted more than C$700 million to undisclosed beneficiaries through some deals in Latin America.
Following the report, Aphria formed a special committee of independent directors to review its Latin American deals.
“I can confirm that this special committee is making good progress, assisted by independent advisors, and intends to fully address short-seller allegations,” Neufeld said on a post-earnings call with analysts.
The company did not give a date for Neufeld’s exit from his role. The company’s co-founder, Cole Cacciavillani, would also leave his post as vice president of Growing Operations.
“Cole and I have informed the Board, and they have agreed that we will begin the transition process immediately, and at the appropriate time, we will both step down from executive positions at Aphria,” Neufeld said.
Like rivals Canopy Growth Corp and Tilray Inc, Aphria has been investing heavily to expand its footprint in international markets including Europe and Latin America.
The company signed a deal with German pharmaceutical company CC Pharma in November and entered into agreements to grow and sell pot in Colombia, Argentina and Jamaica last month.
Canada legalized recreational marijuana in October, and the sector is expected to get a boost as many other countries move closer to legalization.
Aphria’s net income jumped eightfold to C$54.8 million during the quarter.
In a regulatory filing, Great Point Partners disclosed a 6.95% stake in BioCryst, which reprsents about 7.6M shares. The filing does not allow for activism.
Facebook “addiction” — not only spending lots of time on Facebook but also seeing negative social impacts from it, yet craving it and trying unsuccessfully to cut down — was associated with impaired decision-making in one study and with self-perceived physical ill health in another.
In the first, researchers gave 71 participants recruited from a German university 100 tries each at the computerized Iowa Gambling Task, in which players should learn from prior rewards and punishments to make better bets — in other words, a test of value-based decision-making.
Higher scores on the Bergen Facebook Addiction Scale were significantly correlated with worse performance in the final 20 game trials (r=-0.31, P<0.01), found Dar Meshi, PhD, assistant professor of advertising and public relations at Michigan State University in East Lansing, and colleagues. Their study was published online in the Journal of Behavioral Addictions.
This finding, that Facebook “addicts” made riskier decisions than non-addicts as the game went on, implies that they were more likely to ignore the potential for losses, the investigators said. Notably, there was no such association between Facebook addiction and decision-making earlier in the game.
The study “further supports a parallel between individuals with problematic, excessive SNS [social networking site] use and individuals with substance use and behavioral addictive disorders,” they concluded. Research published earlier this week also found an association with depression.
Excessive social networking can seep into other aspects of users’ lives as they build up tolerance to sites’ social rewards, Meshi and colleagues said, just as opioid users require increasing doses over time to achieve the same effects. “These excessive SNS users also experience conflict with others because of their use, and when attempting to quit, they display withdrawal symptoms and often relapse,” the researchers wrote.
While many in the mental health field have come to accept online behaviors as potentially addictive, the American Psychiatric Association has not formally recognized any. The closest it has come is designating “internet gaming disorder” in its current diagnostic manual, DSM-5, as a possible condition warranting further study. Addictions to other online activities such as social media are not mentioned at all.
And that aside, one specialist contacted by MedPage Today urged caution in interpreting the current study owing to its design.
“While this area of research is intriguing and it is possible that excessive digital media use may have adverse effects on cognitive functioning, this particular study does not provide strong support one way or another of whether decision making dysfunction may actually be a consequence of excessive digital media use,” commented Adam Leventhal, PhD, director of the University of Southern California’s Health, Emotion, & Addiction Laboratory in Los Angeles, who was not part of the study.
“Because of the study design, we cannot determine whether the risky decision making patterns preceded or followed excessive Facebook use in the participants. It is possible that people who make risky decisions are more drawn to highly-stimulating digital activities like social networking platforms because it suits their sensation-seeking personality styles,” he said.
Facebook and Physical Illness
In a separate study conducted by Bridget Dibb, MSc, PhD, of the University of Surrey in England, Facebook users who reported feeling inspired by friends they perceived as better off tended to feel more sick themselves.
From a survey of 165 Facebook users, the one specific type of social comparison linked to more physical symptoms was the positive feeling of seeing someone better off, Dibb reported online in Heliyon.
“The positive upward comparison relationship in this study shows that the participants were feeling hopeful and inspired but at the same time were aware of worse physical health,” she wrote. “It is also possible that those who had more physical symptoms tended to engage in more positive upward comparison to be more like the better-off target. This may be a coping strategy and would account for why those engaging in upward comparison would also be more aware of their symptoms.”
In contrast, negative feelings after seeing the better-off person (“I could never be like him or her”) weren’t significantly associated with physical health, nor were the negative feelings (“What if I become like him or her?”) or positive feelings (“At least I’m not like that”) after encountering somebody comparably worse off.
Moreover, the more survey respondents said they felt that Facebook was part of their lives, the more physical ailments they perceived personally.
Dibb acknowledged that the study design precluded any causal links between physical health and Facebook use; she suggested a longitudinal study to show whether social comparison leads to perceptions of ill health or if those who experience worse health are inherently more likely to seek inspiration from peers. The experiment by Meshi and colleagues also only documented an association, not a causal relationship.
Moreover, neither study accounted for use of other social media platforms such as Instagram and Twitter.
Dibb and Meshi disclosed no conflicts of interest.
Meshi’s study was funded by a German Research Foundation grant.
The tools of artificial intelligence continue to be essential elements for the biopharma industry. Companies across the sphere have invested heavily into the technology and this week, several more companies have announced deals that bank on the use of artificial intelligence.
San Francisco-based Atomwiseforged an alliance with Charles River LaboratoriesInternational to unite unites AI technology with premium research services. The collaboration brings together two leaders in their fields. Atomwise is a leader in artificial intelligence structure-based drug discovery and Charles River Labs is the leading contract research organization.
As part of the agreement, Atomwise, which developed the first deep learning AI technology for structure-based small molecule drug discovery, will provide its technology to Charles River for multiple projects. The artificial intelligence applications will provide a greater ability to identify chemically diverse hit compounds for drug development. This partnership is expected to bring previously intractable targets and safer therapeutic options to market faster, the companies said.
Atomwise Chief Executive Officer Abraham Heifets noted that across the biopharma industry, companies trust Charles River Labs to take their discoveries “from an idea into the clinic.” In turn, he said Charles River Labs trusts Atomwise to enhance that process through its AI technology.
Under terms of the collaboration agreement, Atomwise will support hit discovery, hit-to-lead, and lead optimization efforts. Charles River will provide technology access fees, milestone-based payments and royalties from clients. Atomwise projects that the total potential value of the royalties to Atomwise with success in all projects could exceed S2.4 billion.
In Boston, Beta Bionics, Inc. closed out a $63 million Series B financing round that will support the development of its machine learning and artificial intelligence technologies that will be used to potentially develop the world’s first autonomous bionic pancreas. Beta Bionics developed the iLet Bionic Pancreas System, which was recently tested in home-use clinical trials in 2018 in adults and children with type 1 diabetes. The iLet pancreas system is a pocket-sized, wearable medical device that autonomously controls blood-sugar levels in people with diabetes. The system includes what the company called “clinically tested mathematical dosing algorithms” that “autonomously calculate and dose insulin and/or glucagon as needed, based on data from a continuous glucose monitor.” The Series B funding, which was supported in part by ArrowMark Partners and LifeSci Venture Partners, will be used to initiate Phase III trials for the iLet system, as well as support regulatory submission of the iLet PMA application to the US Food and Drug Administration.
Ed Damiano founder and CEO of Beta Bionics said the support for the Series B was larger than initially expected, which has placed the company in a much stronger position for 2019 to advance its bionic pancreas. Other investors in Beta Bionics include Eli Lilly, Novo Nordisk, Zealand Pharma and Dexcom.
Earlier this week, Elevian and Insilico Biotechnologyentered into a research and development agreement to use AI to boost development of oral medications targeting the GDF11 pathway and associated targets as part of an effort to develop treatments for the diseases of aging. The collaboration will take advantage of Insilico’s generative adversarial networks (GANs) and reinforcement learning (RL) AI technologies to discover novel small molecules that target the GDF11 pathway, Elevian announced.
The deals amplifying the use of artificial intelligence come hard on the heels of a report that showed the number of Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approvals of proprietary medical algorithms powered by artificial intelligence for image interpretation is growing, RAPS (Regulatory Affairs Professional Society reported. According to the report, FDA approval of AI increased significantly during 2018. There were, on average, one to two approvals per month during the year, compared to just two approvals for the entirety of 2017. As a result, the FDA is developing a new regulatory guidance for AI, RAPS said.
For decades the left has been pushing “single payer” health care without ever coming clean about how much it would cost. Now, thanks to Bernie Sanders, we have our answer. And the price tag is mind-boggling.
Sanders’ plan would eliminate private insurance, Medicare, Medicaid, and ObamaCare in favor of a single, government-run program, which he calls “Medicare for all.” There’d be no out-of-pocket costs for health care and long-term care.
When he released his plan, Sanders claimed it would cost about $14 trillion over 10 years. But not to worry, he said, since it would be fully paid for by the rich, and the middle class, and the working class, who would all see their taxes go up.
However, a new study from the liberal Urban Institute says that Sanders’s plan would cost more than twice what he says.
For starters, Sanders claims that he could somehow extend free care to everyone while still spending $6 trillion less over the next decade than would be the case.
Wrong. The Urban Institutes says that Sanders’ plan would actually increase national health spending by $6.6 trillion. The reason is simple enough — providing “free” care would encourage more people to use health care.
In addition, the report says, Sanders would have the federal government pick up all health costs currently paid for by state and local governments, as well as all costs paid for by individuals and businesses.
When you add it all up, the Urban Institute says, the price tag works out to $32 trillion over 10 years. In other words, Sanders’ plan would increase the already gargantuan size of the federal government by almost two-thirds.
Yes, state and local government, businesses and individuals will save money on premiums and out-of-pocket costs. But the idea that they’d be better off requires a suspension of disbelief that is almost impossible to maintain.
The idea that a central government can plan 1/6th of the economy better than the private sector, for example, is belied by every other attempt at socialism.
And anyone who thinks health care quality would improve just needs to look at the string of calamities in Canada, the U.K. or the single-payer Veterans Health Administration, which are each characterized by massive waste, chronic delays, doctor strikes, lack of innovation and worse outcomes for specific diseases.
Medicare itself, which is what Sanders wants to extend to everyone, is rife with waste, fraud and abuse. A recent Government Accountability Office report found that improper payments accounted for 10% of its budget.
Sanders’ response is that the Urban Institute is wrong about the federal government taking over state and local health costs. But even so, that would only knock the bill down to $28 trillion.
He also says the Urban Institute “significantly underestimates the savings in administration, paperwork and prescription drug prices that every major country on earth has successfully achieved by adopting a universal health care program.”
But as IBD has pointed out, Sanders overestimates the potential savings. Even if his plan could miraculously eliminate all public and private overhead costs, he’d still be $2 trillion shy of his promised $6 trillion in savings, government data show.
Give Sanders credit for exposing the enormous cost of the left’s socialist dreams. And give him credit for making it clear how extreme the Democratic Party, which made Sanders a serious contender for the nomination, has become.
In a regulatory filing, Morgan Stanley disclosed a 5% stake in PetMed Express, which represents 1.03M shares. The filing does not allow for activism. https://thefly.com/landingPageNews.php?id=2847755
