According to a post on social media, LabCorp (LH +0.3%) is about to announce that it will offer free COVID-19 blood tests to anyone through their doctor. Its only request is a donation of plasma from those having antibodies.
Thursday, July 30, 2020
Pandemic Spike in Telehealth Levels Off, Still Significantly Up in Medicare
Telehealth’s early bonanza during the pandemic has given way to persistently elevated use in primary care, a Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) report showed.
Analysis of Medicare fee-for-service (FFS) data showed an increase in Medicare primary care visits from 0.1% of all primary care in February to 43.5% in April, representing an increase from about 2,000 to 1.28 million telehealth visits per week.
Meanwhile, there was a “precipitous” drop in in-person visits for primary care in mid-March as COVID-19 took hold in the U.S., then a rise from mid-April through May, according to the report from the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation.
Use of telehealth in primary care “declined somewhat but appears to have leveled off at a persistent and significant level by the beginning of June,” the report noted. It still accounted for 22.7% of Medicare beneficiaries’ primary care visits as of June 3rd.
Overall, weekly primary care visit rates have not yet returned to pre-pandemic levels.
“Based on early experience with Medicare primary care telehealth at the start of the COVID-19 public health emergency, there is evidence that Medicare’s new telehealth flexibilities played a critical role in helping to maintain access to primary health care services — when many beneficiaries and providers were concerned with transmission of COVID-19,” the authors noted. “The stable and sustained use of telehealth after in-person primary care visits started to resume in mid-April suggests there may be continued demand for telehealth in Medicare, even after the pandemic ends.”
The findings overall match those from healthcare provider databases suggesting a 60% to 70% drop in health care office visits, partially offset by telehealth visits, with the start of the pandemic. Drug market research firm IQVIA has reported from physician surveys that about 9% of patient interactions were via telehealth prior to the pandemic but 51% during the shutdown, with expectation of a 21% rate after the pandemic, the HHS report noted.
There have been calls for Medicare to make the loosened rules around telemedicine permanent, and some legislative movement in that direction, but private insurers have signaled the opposite.
Fred Pelzman, MD, an internal medicine physician at Weill Cornell Medicine in New York City (and MedPage Today columnist), said an informal survey of his patients indicated they would be willing to do up to 50% of their care via video tools.
“We went from a handful of video visits in our practice to several thousand over the course of the months,” he said. “It’s a great way to take care of people, kept a lot of people safe, we think. What has happened is that as we started to open our practice back up again and offer appointments, the floodgates have opened and patients are declining video visits.”
Those patients opting for in-person visits tend to be older, braving what feels like a quiet time in the pandemic for the state to take care of necessary visits, he noted. “I think ultimately that we’ll plateau. It will probably come down a little more.”
The study included Medicare FFS Part B claims from January through May 2020 for primary care services along with preliminary Medicare Part B primary care claims data up to June 3. Primary care services included evaluation and management, preventive services, and advance care planning.
Telehealth usage increased most in urban counties early in the pandemic and saw smaller declines in May compared with rural counties across the country. Among cities, Boston had the greatest proportion of primary care visits by telehealth (73.1%) and Phoenix the lowest (37%).
Notably, the rate “was not strongly associated with differences in COVID-19 severity across cities as measured by rate of hospitalizations per thousand Medicare FFS beneficiaries,” the report pointed out.
Primary Source
Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation Brief
AlloVir opens at 18% premium in U.S. debut
AlloVir (ALVR) opened at $20 today, ~18% above its IPO price of $17.
The Cambridge, MA-based biotech develops allogeneic off-the-shelf T cell therapies designed to restore immunity in patients with T cell deficiencies who are at risk of life-threatening consequences of viral diseases.
Lead candidate is Viralym-M, a multi-VST (virus-specific T cell) therapy targeting five viruses (BK, CMV, AdV, EBV and HHV-6) for immunocompromised patients who have undergone allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplant or solid organ transplant at risk of infection from the five viruses. A Phase 3 clinical trial in patients with virus-associated hemorrhagic cystitis is next up.
Fauci Accused Of ‘Misinformation Campaign’ Against Hydroxychloroquine
With the science behind the use of hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) to treat COVID-19 far from settled, more than a few people have noted the aggressive campaign against the widely-prescribed anti-malaria drug.
The anti-HCQ push has infected Silicon Valley as well – as tech giants have been labeling pro-hydroxychloroquine content as ‘misinformation’ – most recently banishing a press conference by a group of doctors touting the drug from just about every platform.
To that end, Yale epidemiologist Dr. Harvey Risch has accused Dr. Anthony Fouci of waging a “misinformation campaign” against the drug, according to Just The News.
On Tuesday during an interview on “Good Morning America,” Fauci further downplayed the drug’s purported benefit, claiming that “the overwhelming prevailing clinical trials that have looked at the efficacy of hydroxychloroquine have indicated that it is not effective in [treating] coronavirus disease.”Risch, however, is sharply criticizing Fauci’s approach to evaluating the drug’s effectiveness, arguing that repeated trials and tests have shown that it is markedly effective at treating COVID-19 so long as it is administered properly.…On Tuesday, Risch went further, charging in an interview with Just the News that Fauci is perpetrating a “misinformation campaign” in his opposition to the drug.Fauci “has been maintaining a studious position that only randomized controlled trial evidence has any value,” Risch said, “and everything else he calls anecdotal.” –Just The News
In a Newsweek Op-Ed published last week, Risch called HCQ “the key to defeating COVID-19,” and said it was particularly effective in conjunction with one of two antibiotics and zinc, saying it has “shown to be highly effective.”
Risch said the drug could save 100,000 lives if widely deployed.
Meanwhile, Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Commissioner Stephen Hahn noted that some medical observational studies “suggest a benefit” to the drug, also according to Just The News.
“So the FDA looks at all what we call ‘the totality of data,’” Hahn said in a Tuesday morning radio interview with Florida radio host Drew Steele. “There are observational studies that suggest a benefit. There are five randomized trials that did not show a benefit to hydroxychloroquine, both in the prophylactic setting and in the treatment — both early and late.” –Just The News
More recently, Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-TX) announced that he would be taking “zinc, erythromycin and hydroxychloroquine” after being diagnosed with COVID-19 on Wednesday.
Update (1240ET): Ohio Governor Mike DeWine (R) says he agrees with FDA Commissioner Steven Hahn, and has asked the state medical board to “halt their new rule prohibiting the selling or dispensing of hydroxychloroquine or chloroquine for the treatment or prevention of COVID-19.”
Marinus Ganaxolone nabs Rare Pediatric Disease tag for pediatric epilepsy type
The FDA has granted Rare Pediatric Disease Designation to Marinus Pharmaceuticals’ (MRNS +3.1%) for its product candidate Ganaxolone, an allosteric modulator of GABAA receptors, for CDKL5 deficiency disorder (CDD), a rare refractory form of pediatric epilepsy.
CDD is characterized by early‑onset, difficult‑to‑control seizures and severe neuro‑developmental impairment.
Rare Pediatric Disease Designation provides for the issuance of a priority review voucher following FDA approval. The voucher can be used for accelerated approval of future marketing application or it can be sold to a third party.
Qualigen ships its COVID-19 antibody test
Qualigen Therapeutics (QLGN -4.4%) has begun commercial shipments of its FastPack SARS-CoV-2 IgG diagnostic test for COVID-19 antibodies.
This test has been submitted to the FDA for Emergency Use Authorization (EUA), and earlier this month the company submitted an official notification to the FDA of its plans to exercise its right to commence sales, even while the EUA is pending.
The COVID-19 antibody test uses Qualigen’s new FastPack PRO System, a point-of-care diagnostic instrument, and provides results in ~10 minutes.
J&J Vision debuts try-it augmented reality tech app for Acuvue lenses in China
Augmented reality has landed at Johnson & Johnson Vision this summer with a new virtual try-on for Acuvue lenses. A first-of-its-kind launch in China for the company, the app allows users to see how they would look wearing Acuvue’s Define brand contact lens. The virtual on-eye experience debuted in Acuvue’s flagship store on Tmall and on WeChat.
The Define brand lenses accentuate eye color in part by outlining the limbal ring, which is the circular edge of the iris, versus traditional colored lens that cover up the iris. The more subtle effect however, is also more difficult to imagine, making the try-on feature useful—and, by the sales outcome, effective.
J&J Vision debuted the AR experience during the recent “6.18” midyear shopping festival in China with high engagement and an almost 30% consumer purchase conversion rate, J&J Vision said in answer to email questions from Fierce Pharma.
“Digital innovative assets are a great complement to our traditional marketing approach to elevate our consumers’ experience and strengthen our engagement with them,” the company said.
J&J Vision, the eye care business unit inside J&J’s Consumer Health division, partnered with beauty tech company Perfect Corp. for the AR technology.
Perfect Corp. founder and CEO Alice Chang said in a news release that the solution would “offer beauty shoppers a full-range, immersive, hyper-realistic AR beauty experience, leading to a greater brand loyalty and a stronger omnichannel strategy.”
AR technology is increasingly being used by pharma companies with physicians to project 3D images onto real-life views that can help explain how a medicine works or create better empathy with patients. Migraine simulators in virtual headsets or on phones, for example, show how vision and hearing are impacted.
The use of AR for consumers in health and pharma marketing is growing as well. At Cannes Lions Health last year, Sanofi talked about its OTC launch for Allegra in Brazil ,which included an AR campaign that showed users with red noses and watery eyes and even animated sneezes that blew droplets on the phone screen.
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