Twist Bioscience Begins Shipping of Synthetic RNA Controls for UK Covid Variant

-- RNA Controls Can Help Avoid False Negative Results --

Twist Bioscience Corporation (Nasdaq: TWST), a company enabling customers to succeed through its offering of high-quality synthetic DNA using its silicon platform, today announced that it has started shipping its new synthetic RNA reference controls, which includes the new variant strain of SARS-CoV-2 identified in the United Kingdom. With this new strain (B1.1.7 lineage, variant under investigation VUI-202012/01), which contains multiple mutations in the spike protein and other areas of the viral genome, some of the RT-PCR probes used widely in COVID-19 testing no longer detect the S gene that codes for the spike protein. This can lead to false negative test results.

"By offering synthetic controls for this specific mutation, our customers are able to update their testing protocols, which will help to potentially avoid false negative results when testing for SARS-CoV-2 infection," said Emily M. Leproust, Ph.D., CEO and co-founder of Twist Bioscience. "These controls, used alone or in conjunction with our SARS-CoV-2 NGS RUO Assay to identify all SARS-CoV-2 nucleic acid sequences, are invaluable research tools for monitoring viral evolution and for population-scale surveillance."

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/twist-bioscience-begins-shipping-synthetic-130000296.html

Moderna CEO says the world will have to live with Covid ‘forever’

 The CEO of Covid-19 vaccine maker Moderna warned Wednesday that the coronavirus that has brought world economies to a standstill and overwhelmed hospitals will be around “forever.”

Public health officials and infectious disease experts have said there is a high likelihood that Covid-19 will become an endemic disease, meaning it will become present in communities at all times, though likely at lower levels than it is now.

Moderna CEO Stephane Bancel appeared to agree Wednesday that Covid-19 will become endemic, saying “SARS-CoV-2 is not going away.”

“We are going to live with this virus, we think, forever,” he said during a panel discussion at the JPMorgan Healthcare Conference.

Health officials will have to continuously watch for new variants of the virus, so scientists can produce vaccines to fight them, he said. Researchers in Ohio said Wednesday they’ve discovered two new variants likely originating in the U.S. and that one of them quickly became the dominant strain in Columbus, Ohio, over a three-week period in late December and early January.

Pfizer researchers said its vaccine developed with BioNTech appeared to be effective against a key mutation in the U.K. strain as well as a variant found in South Africa.

Moderna’s vaccine has been authorized by the Food and Drug Administration for use in Americans who are 18 years old and older. Additional studies still needed to be completed in children, whose immune systems can respond differently to vaccines than those of adults.

U.S. officials are racing to distribute doses of both vaccines, but it will likely take months before the U.S. can vaccinate enough people to achieve herd immunity, meaning the virus won’t have enough new hosts to spread. Still, Bancel said Wednesday he expects the U.S. will be one of the first large countries to achieve “sufficient protection” against the virus.

There are already four coronaviruses that are endemic across the world, but they aren’t as contagious or deadly as Covid-19, according to the World Health Organization.

https://www.cnbc.com/2021/01/13/moderna-ceo-says-the-world-will-have-to-live-with-the-coronavirus-forever.html

Dollar General plans to pay employees to get COVID-19 vaccination

 Dollar General Corp will offer frontline employees four hours worth of pay after they get the COVID-19 vaccine, the discount retailer said on Wednesday, making it one of first U.S. companies to incentivize its workers to get inoculated.

The retailer, which has about 140,000 employees, said that it was providing hourly employees the one-time benefit to compensate for the time away from the store, while they received the vaccine. 

The company added that it was working with distribution and transportation teams to make similar accommodations and said it was providing salaried employees additional store labor hours.

The discount store chain did not mandate all employees to get the vaccine, but encouraged them to do so.

Dollar General was deemed an essential service during the lockdowns, and became one of the few retailers to remain open for people to buy groceries and other daily supplies.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-dollar-general/dollar-general-plans-to-pay-employees-to-get-covid-19-vaccination-idUSKBN29I25G?il=0&utm_source=reddit.com

Merck & Co buys into Kras

 A low-key research collaboration struck a year ago has led to Merck & Co today taking out an exclusive licence to an anticancer project targeting the Kras pathway. The work had originated at Otsuka, and focuses on inhibiting SHP2, an enzyme thought to play a role in cycling Kras between its “on” and “off” states. Though this is still preclinical, Merck has clearly seen enough to part with more cash; a year ago it had given Otsuka’s Taiho and Astex subsidiaries $50m to set up a research alliance into Kras, and today’s option for full rights involves a second payment, understood to amount to at least as much again. Direct inhibition of Kras is at present a battle between Amgen’s sotorasib and Mirati’s adagrasib, but other companies are working on indirect ways of hitting this target, which until recently had been thought to be undruggable. Such pathways include SOS1, under investigation at Bayer and Boehringer Ingelheim, as well as SHP2. The Merck programme’s most advanced competitors in this latter space are Novartis/Mirati’s TNO155 and Revolution/Sanofi's SAR442720.

Src homology phosphatase (SHP) 2 inhibitor pipeline
Project	Company	Comment
TNO155	Novartis/Mirati	Ph1/2 (Krystal-2) study in Kras G12C mutants
RMC-4630 (SAR442720)	Revolution Medicines/Sanofi	Ph1/2 combo trial; deal signed Jul 2018
RLY-1971	Relay Therapeutics	First-in-human ph1 started Feb 2020
BBP-398 (IACS-15509 / IACS-13909)	Navire (Bridgebio Pharma)	First-in-human ph1 started Aug 2020
ERAS-601	Erasca	First-in-human ph1 (Flagshp-1) started Jan 2021
HBI-2376	Huya Bioscience/Suzhou Genhouse	Preclinical; licensing deal Aug 2020
SHP2 programme	Merck & Co/Otsuka	Preclinical; licensing option exercised Jan 2021
SHP2 inhibitors	Redx Pharma	Earlier mentioned as a research project
Source: company announcements.

https://www.evaluate.com/vantage/articles/news/snippets/merck-co-buys-kras

Humana, athenahealth team to embed member data in providers' EHR workflows

 Humana and athenahealth have unveiled a multiyear partnership in which the insurer will embed member insights into the company's electronic health record, athenaClinicals.

These data insights will allow providers to see critical patient information within their existing EHR workflows, and also aims to make it easier for providers to engage in value-based care arrangements, the companies said in an announcement.

For example, a patient with diabetes could become overwhelmed with the number of annual screenings required to manage their condition, according to the announcement. Alerts generated by Humana's data can assist providers in addressing potential gaps in care for those patients.

“At Humana, we constantly strive to help providers deliver better outcomes to members and enhance our providers’ healthcare experience,” said Alan Wheatley, Humana’s retail segment president, in a segment. “Working closely with athenahealth allows us to improve care quality and simplify administrative processes for provider organizations.”

The partnership will also build on Humana providers' existing use of athenahealth's Real-Time Benefits Check and will offer them additional data at the point of care.

Real-Time Benefits Check allows docs to quickly view a patients' prescription drug coverage to track costs and choose lower-cost options when appropriate. The additional data in tandem will allow providers to track patients' health.

“Humana is leveraging athenahealth's innovative technology to improve provider's financial health and satisfaction," said Bob Segert, chairman and CEO of athenahealth, in a statement. "With this collaboration, we will deliver consistent data-driven insights to physicians at the point of care, to help them assess the best treatment options for every patient, especially those suffering from chronic conditions.

"Connecting payers and providers is a vital step toward realizing our vision to create a thriving ecosystem that delivers accessible, high-quality, and sustainable healthcare for all," Segert said.

https://www.fiercehealthcare.com/payer/humana-athenahealth-team-to-embed-member-data-providers-ehr-workflows

JPM21: Cerner eyes $1B data business as it expands reach into pharma market

 Building on its acquisition of clinical research company Kantar Health, health IT giant Cerner is setting its sights on building a $1 billion data business for the healthcare and life sciences industries.

Cerner announced plans in December to acquire the health division of Kantar Group, which provides data, analytics and research to the life sciences industry, for $375 million.

The company is looking to create a leading data insights and clinical research platform and wants to harness data to improve the safety, efficiency and efficacy of clinical research across life sciences, pharmaceuticals and healthcare at large.

Data analytics and research have been a strong focus for Cerner in the past 18 months, said Don Trigg, president of Cerner, during a presentation Wednesday at the annual J.P. Morgan healthcare conference. The conference was held virtually.

Cerner launched its Learning Health Network in 2019 to offer member health systems free access to a network of standardized, de-identified data and resources to support research efforts. Former Optum and Lumeris executive Art Glasgow also joined the company two years ago to drive the strategy forward, Trigg said.

In spite of the COVID-19 pandemic, the company exceeded its 2020 goal by adding 55 members to the Learning Health Network, and those organizations represent almost 100 million patients and 500 million clinical encounters.

"With did some things before COVID with partnership strategies to engage with life sciences and pharma organizations and prove out the value of the Learning Health Network," Trigg said.

Through the acquisition of Kantar Health, Cerner will offer its Learning Health Network clients direct engagement with the life sciences industry for funded research studies, the company said.

"We think this set us up well before COVID, during COVID, and looking out after COVID to play a defining role in transforming the speed and cost of clinical trials and building a billion-dollar data business," he said.

With the acquisition, Kantar Health brings differentiated real-world data assets, strong relationships with the world’s leading life science companies and medical affairs expertise.

"We’re excited about this acquisition. We think it’s on strategy in terms of representing a large and mega trend around real-world evidence, which is a large and growing addressable market with 20%-plus growth," Trigg said. "It's the kind of opportunities we’re looking for with EMR-agnostic, high growth, and high margin businesses in this space."

Electronic health record (EHR) companies are expanding their capabilities into real-world data and analytics as they branch out from their traditional, core EHR businesses. Cerner competitor Allscripts is seeing strong growth in its Veradigm business, which offers solutions targeted at both life science companies and payers. 

In 2018, Veradigm partnered with NextGen Healthcare to enable data exchange between providers and health plans, insurance companies, laboratories and research organizations. The agreement created one of the largest EHR data networks in the world, with approximately 150 million unique patient records to provide "advanced analytic solutions and insights focused on improving care quality and patient outcomes," the company said.

The Veradigm business also collaborated with Komodo Health to create the largest linked data set of EHR and claims data containing a complete longitudinal view of nearly 50 million identified patients for life sciences research.

Real-world evidence is disrupting traditional clinical trials, and the COVID-19 regulatory response is accelerating this shift, according to Cerner. The company's large provider base and healthcare data expertise offer the opportunity to re-imagine this market, Trigg said.

"We bring some intriguing points of differentiation" to the market, Trigg said Wednesday, noting that one-third of U.S. hospitals are using its Millennium EHR and related health IT systems

"We have a high density of community hospitals and health systems that don’t traditionally have an opportunity to participate in the clinical trial activity. And, we have multiple decades of experience dealing with the complexities of healthcare data."

In response to the pandemic, Cerner partnered with Amazon Web Services to provide healthcare researchers with free access to COVID-19 patient data to support epidemiological studies, clinical trials and medical treatments.

"We're seeing some best-in-class research around COVID-19 that we think proves out the power of the clinical data and proves out the after-COVID opportunity for this data asset," Trigg said.

https://www.fiercehealthcare.com/tech/jpm21-cerner-wants-to-build-a-1b-data-business-as-it-expands-reach-into-pharma-market

JPM21: Walgreens new tech startup aimed at developing comprehensive patient platform

 Walgreens is establishing a tech-enabled healthcare startup with the goal of creating a new patient platform that blends physical and digital tools, company leadership said.

Executives with the retail pharmacy chain detailed the tech startup, which is expected to launch in the fourth quarter of the company’s fiscal year, during a talk Wednesday during the annual J.P. Morgan healthcare conference. The decision is part of a larger trend in the pharmacy space of retail chains aiming to expand their digital offerings.

“We see an extremely complex healthcare system in the U.S. where the patients are confused,” said Walgreens Chief Financial Officer James Kehoe on the need for the startup. “Somebody with multiple conditions getting calls from three advisers.”

He added that “everybody has a point of view on how they manage their health. We believe we can, because of our assets, provide a unique interface between patients and partners to create an ecosystem of healthcare.”

Kehoe said that the startup will use the brand equity of Walgreens and consumer trust combined with neutrality among payers or providers.

“We are company agnostic and continue to operate agnostic and work with everybody in a partnership mentality,” he said.

The startup will put together a customer engagement platform that includes a personalization engine.

“Ultimately, it is the patient that matters, and we will provide a platform based on a health marketplace that allows each patient to find care, get care and manage care,” Kehoe said.

He added that the startup wouldn’t fully build the platform itself but through a series of partnerships, and the startup will be a “company within a company.”

He gave an example of a contract with My Med to help build out a medical adherence section.

Kehoe said that a digital or physical-only platform can be successful.

“It is the intersection of the two and offering every single patient their choice on who they want to manage their healthcare,” he said.

The startup's announcement is the latest bid by a retail pharmacy chain to transform their stores to offer more digital options.

Rite Aid, for example, announced last fall it was rolling out a rebrand of its stores to put the pharmacist front and center. The stores will include virtual care rooms to enable customers to remotely connect to any care teams.

Pharmacy chains are also competing with a new online offering from Amazon, which rolled out a pharmacy arm late last year.

https://www.fiercehealthcare.com/payer/walgreens-announces-creation-new-tech-startup-aimed-at-developing-comprehensive-patient