Hemophilia B Gene Therapy Sustains Efficacy Over a Decade Later

 

• At a median 13 years after a single infusion of AAV-mediated gene therapy, factor IX expression remained stable in 10 patients with severe hemophilia B.
• The median annualized bleeding rate decreased from 14 episodes to 1.5 episodes, representing a median rate reduction by a factor of 9.7.
• No late-onset safety concerns were observed.

A single infusion of adeno-associated virus (AAV)-mediated gene therapy led to sustained clinical benefit and no late-onset safety concerns in patients with severe hemophilia B, a longitudinal study showed.

At a median follow-up of 13 years, factor IX expression remained stable in the 10 men across dose groups, with seven not receiving factor IX prophylaxis, reported Amit Nathwani, MBChB, PhD, of University College London, and colleagues.

The median annualized bleeding rate decreased from 14 episodes to 1.5 episodes, representing a median rate reduction by a factor of 9.7, and use of factor IX concentrate decreased by a factor of 12.4, "which considerably alleviated the disease burden," they wrote in the New England Journal of Medicineopens in a new tab or window.

"These findings support the long-term safety and efficacy of AAV gene therapy for hemophilia B, thus offering this group of patients a promising and durable treatment option with recently licensed gene-therapy products," Nathwani and team noted.

In 2014, Nathwani and his group reported on the successful administrationopens in a new tab or window of a single intravenous infusion of a self-complementary, serotype 8 pseudotyped AAV vector encoding a codon-optimized factor IX transgene (scAAV2/8-LP1-hFIXco).

Subsequent studies by other investigators confirmed those early results, ultimately leading to the FDA approval of etranacogene dezaparvovec (Hemgenix) opens in a new tab or windowand fidanacogene elaparvovec (Beqvez)opens in a new tab or window in adults with severe hemophilia.

"However, uncertainties remain regarding the durability of transgene expression," wrote Nathwani and colleagues. "In addition, the long-term safety of AAV-mediated gene transfer remains unclear, and the effect of the humoral immune response to AAV requires ongoing evaluation."

The 10 men with severe hemophilia B received a single dose of scAAV2/8-LP1-hFIXco vector, administered through a peripheral vein, in three dose cohorts (low dose: 2×10¹¹ vector genomes [vg]/kg of body weight [n=2], intermediate dose: 6×10¹¹ vg/kg [n=2], or high dose: 2×10¹² vg/kg [n=6]) between March 2010 and December 2012.

Since 2010, a total of 354 adverse events have been reported; 15 were considered to be associated with AAV gene therapy, including transient elevations in liver aminotransferase levels (of grade 1 or 2) in four of six participants who had been treated with the high vector dose.

There were no cases of factor IX inhibition, thrombosis, recurrent transaminitis, or death. Two cases of cancer developed -- lung adenocarcinoma in a patient with a history of smoking 7 years after receipt of gene therapy, and a case of prostate cancer in a 74-year-old patient 11.6 years after gene therapy was administered. Molecular analysis and a review by an expert multidisciplinary team suggested the cancers were not associated with gene therapy.

At a median of 3.2 years after gene therapy, all participants had dose-dependent increases in factor IX coagulant activity. At 13 years, factor IX activity remained stable, with mean levels of 1.7 IU/dL in the low-dose cohort, 2.3 IU/dL in the intermediate-dose cohort, and 4.8 IU/dL in the high-dose cohort.

Three patients with severe hemophilic arthropathy who had a median of 10 target joints (joints with recurring bleeding episodes) resumed factor IX prophylaxis within 4 years after the receipt of gene therapy due to recurrent spontaneous joint bleeding events.

"Factor IX levels of 1 to 3 IU per deciliter in these participants that had been measured at least 3 days after the infusion proved to be insufficient to prevent such bleeding, a finding that highlights the effect of joint health and other biologic factors on outcomes after the receipt of gene therapy," the authors observed.

Disclosures

This study was supported by grants from the U.K. Medical Research Council, the Katharine Dormandy Trust, the U.K. Department of Health, NHS Blood and Transplant, the National Institute for Health Research (including a Biomedical Research Centres funding award to University College London Hospitals and University College London), the Royal Free Hospital Charity, the Innovative Medicines Initiative, the Assisi Foundation of Memphis, the Hemophilia of Georgia Foundation, the Colburn-Keenan Foundation, the American Lebanese Syrian Associated Charities, and the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute.

Nathwani has a patent on an FIX expression cassette.

Several co-authors reported multiple relationships with industry.

Primary Source

New England Journal of Medicine

Source Reference: opens in a new tab or windowReiss UM, et al "Sustained clinical benefit of AAV gene therapy in severe hemophilia B" N Engl J Med 2025; DOI: 10.1056/NEJMoa2414783.

https://www.medpagetoday.com/hematologyoncology/hemophilia/116033

Sleep Apnea Patients More Ready for GLP-1 Drugs Than Sleep Clinics Are

 Weight loss drugs have gained momentum as treatment for obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) at sleep clinics across the country -- although patients appear more ready for the shift than the clinical team is.

In December, GLP-1 agonist tirzepatide (Zepbound) became the first drug approvedopens in a new tab or window to treat moderate-to-severe obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) in adults with obesity after two trials showed it reduced sleep apnea severity opens in a new tab or windowregardless of continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) use. That opened up a new era in treatment of this condition that affects perhaps a billion people worldwide.

"It's an exciting time for the sleep field. Pharmacotherapy is here, it's not just coming," Atul Malhotra, MD, of the University of California San Diego (UCSD), told attendees at the SLEEP meetingopens in a new tab or window hosted jointly by the American Academy of Sleep Medicine (AASM) and the Sleep Research Society.

While CPAP remains first-line treatment for OSA, his group presented data at the meeting showing that patients are more willing to bypass it in favor of medication, he said at an invited lecture.

In a national online survey including responses from 17 UCSD sleep medicine professionals and 365 patients (42% women), patients were more likely than the professionals to prefer tirzepatide over CPAP if equally effective (48% vs 35%). Physicians mostly favored CPAP over tirzepatide (53% vs 26%).

Nearly all the providers endorsed CPAP as "very acceptable," compared with only 60% of patients (P=0.04 for difference in responses).

Co-author Ahmed Khalaf, BS, a sleep technician at UCSD, acknowledged that the patients who opted in represented only about 5% of those approached, which might have provided a biased group. About half had comorbid obesity and obstructive sleep apnea, 73% reported three or more prior attempts at weight loss, 23% reported being current or past users of a GLP-1 drug, and 78% reported being current or past users of CPAP.

Jennifer Martin, PhD, of the University of California Los Angeles and a spokesperson for the AASM, emphasized the importance of allowing patients to choose among sleep treatment options after being fully informed of options.

"CPAP has been the best available treatment for a long time," she told MedPage Today. "It treats sleep apnea in almost everyone, but it doesn't fit into everyone's lifestyle. So I think that oftentimes talking through the risks and benefits of a variety of treatments with a patient is really the best way to start, and being willing to pivot if the treatment you try first doesn't work. So I think GLP-1s will fit into that narrative really nicely."

Peter Gay, MD, of the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, noted the simultaneous challenge and opportunity: "A lot of patients are now coming to the lab who wouldn't come to the lab because all we had was 'C-crap' and they weren't going to even look at you. Now they come and maybe the drug didn't work and now they're talking about CPAP. It's a wonderful time. My problem is and the institution problem is this requires longitudinal care. And how they're going to be able to access the sleep laboratory at Mayo is overwhelming."

Malhotra, noting that he's married to an endocrinologist, agreed that the field is still getting its feet under it with regard to prescription drugs.

"About 80% of the calls that I get are about these agents, but not about medical care -- it's about logistics. It's about prescription authorization, it's about shortages," he said, responding to Gay at the session. "Those things are getting better ... It's going to require resources to achieve this."

"We're trying to transfer this to primary care physicians," Gay noted.

"They're overwhelmed too," Malhotra shot back, noting that at least one in seven Americans have tried to get a GLP-1 receptor agonist.

Indeed, some patients are actually seeing OSA as their ticket to get a GLP-1, said Loretta Colvin, APRN-CNP, of SSM Health Medical Group in Fenton, Missouri. "They're motivated to get a diagnosis, which is weird. You never get people motivated to get a diagnosis."

More patients are coming to the sleep clinic saying they've been started on a GLP-1 drug in primary care, she told MedPage Today.

"So they're taking more of an initiative to treat sleep apnea, where they used to defer more to the sleep clinic," Colvin said. "We're actually talking about the impacts of weight loss in ways that we've never talked about before, because we never saw that many people losing weight successfully other than weight loss surgery -- and then they lost it so fast and they had so many other things going on they just got lost to follow-up in the sleep clinic by and large."

Disclosures

The study was supported by grants from the National Institutes of Health and the AASM Foundation.

Khalaf disclosed no relevant conflicts of interest.

Malhotra disclosed relationships with Eli Lilly, LivaNova, Zoll, and Powell Mansfield as well as ResMed philanthropic funds to his institution.

Colvin disclosed having served on a medical advisory board for Apnimed.

Martin disclosed no relevant relationships with industry.

Primary Source

SLEEP

Source Reference: opens in a new tab or windowKhalaf A "The treatment preferences for comorbid obesity and obstructive sleep apnea (PRO-CON OSA) survey" SLEEP 2025; Abstract 0787.

https://www.medpagetoday.com/meetingcoverage/apss/116034

More Data Back CAR T-Cell Therapy for Lupus, With Promise of Wider Availability

 Chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy for rheumatologic disease is now expanding out of academe into the commercial space, with encouraging new data reported here from a U.S.-based industry program.

A CAR T-cell treatment under development by Philadelphia-based Cabaletta Bio for systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) aimed at reconstituting patients' B cells appeared highly effective, according to Saira Sheikh, MD, of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, although follow-up so far has been relatively short.

Three of four patients with refractory non-renal SLE achieved complete remission, she told attendees at the European Alliance of Associations for Rheumatology's (EULAR) annual meetingopens in a new tab or window. She added that the one who didn't qualify failed only on a technicality.

Also, the first patient with lupus nephritis with enough follow-up to judge renal remission did indeed obtain it, she said.

All seven patients treated thus far, with follow-up of 12 to 52 weeks, have stopped all immunomodulator and corticosteroid treatment, Sheikh noted.

CAR T-cell therapy has excited the rheumatology field like no other treatment approach since the advent of tumor necrosis factor inhibitors and other antibody-based drugs. By engineering patients' T cells ex vivo to destroy their autoantibody-producing B cells, the idea is that when B cells eventually grow back, they will be normal again -- essentially providing a "reset" to the immune system. This approach originated in oncology, where the aim is to eliminate B-cell cancers such as lymphoma.

Probably the leading exponent in rheumatology has been Georg Schett, MD, of Friedrich-Alexander-Universität in Erlangen, Germany, whose program has now treated 20 patients with SLE, systemic sclerosis, and idiopathic inflammatory myositis (IIM). Originally, this group was doing the ex-vivo engineering in-house, but it now has a commercial tie with a German firm, Miltenyi Biomedicineopens in a new tab or window. At EULAR, Schett reportedopens in a new tab or window that all patients evaluable for efficacy have obtained remission or major clinical responses.

Numbers of other groups have jumped on board as well. At last year's EULAR meeting, highly favorable resultsopens in a new tab or window from another commercial sponsor, iCell Gene Therapeutics in Stony Brook, New York, were reported, and this year's meeting features more.

Sheikh was the first to take the podium in an oral presentation here, discussing early results from an ongoing phase I/II trial called RESET-SLE. Eight lupus patients have been treated thus far, including four with nephritis and four without. Sheikh presented findings from those who had at least 1 month of follow-up, which excluded one of the nephritis patients.

They ranged in age from 18 to 44, and two were men. Their disease was long established, with symptoms poorly controlled despite standard therapies including corticosteroids, antimalarials, immunosuppressants, and, in most cases, biologic agents. Two patients had tried seven drugs without lasting benefit. SLE Disease Activity Index-2K (SLEDAI-2K) scores prior to undergoing Cabaletta's CAR T-cell therapy ranged from 8 to 26, indicating moderate to severe disease.

Six of the patients, of whom four had non-renal SLE, had follow-up of at least 24 weeks. Of those, five showed dramatic clinical responses, and one with lupus nephritis and exactly 24 weeks of follow-up had a substantial but not miraculous improvement.

The SLE patient with a full year of follow-up had achieved remission at week 48 but had to go on cyclosporine for an episode of macrophage activation syndrome, Sheikh explained, and thus did not qualify as having remission at the most recent formal follow-up. She said that the episode was most likely from a viral infection and probably not related either to lupus or the CAR T-cell therapy, at least directly. Moreover, Sheikh said, she learned after preparing her EULAR data presentation that the patient had fully recovered and stopped the cyclosporine.

Among the lupus nephritis patients, the one with longer follow-up (44 weeks) saw SLEDAI-2K scores plummet from 22 to zero, and met other criteria for complete clinical and renal response. The patient with 24 weeks of follow-up hadn't yet seen such a steep decline (from 14 to 6), and the estimated glomerular filtration rate remained at baseline level. Urine protein-creatinine ratio did fall somewhat (4.9 to 2.7).

Only one participant had serious adverse events. That was the lupus nephritis patient with 44 weeks of follow-up, who experienced grade 4 immune effector cell-associated neurotoxicity syndrome and grade 4 pancytopenia, as well as mild fever and a grade 1 case of cytokine release syndrome (CRS). These did resolve. One other patient also had grade 1 CRS. No participants developed serious infections.

Sheikh also reported that the treatment appeared to succeed on the lab-test level as well: B cell counts fell rapidly to zero after the CAR T-cells were infused, and began to recover about 2-3 months afterward.

In addition to SLE, Cabaletta is also targeting IIM and hopes to file a marketing application in 2027 for that indication, according to a recent company statementopens in a new tab or window; data from the firm's IIM trial are slated for presentation at EULAR on Friday. Systemic sclerosis is also in Cabaletta's sights.

Disclosures

The study was funded by Cabaletta Bio; most co-authors were its employees. Sheikh reported relationships with the company and with GSK, AstraZeneca, Biogen, and Aurinia Pharmaceuticals. Other academic authors also reported relationships with multiple commercial entities.

Primary Source

European Alliance of Associations for Rheumatology

Source Reference: opens in a new tab or windowSheikh S, et al "RESET-SLE: clinical trial evaluating rese-cel (resecabtagene autoleucel), a fully human, autologous 4-1BB anti-CD19 CAR T cell therapy in non-renal SLE and lupus nephritis" EULAR 2025; Abstract OP0202.

https://www.medpagetoday.com/meetingcoverage/eular/116040

Race: A Social Construct Or Genetic Biomarker?

 A new study from the NIH’s All of Us program is shaking up long-held assumptions by revealing that genetic ancestry rarely aligns with racial labels—and that the interplay between biology and society is far messier than we like to admit. Race might be a helpful lens for understanding inequality, but it’s a terrible shortcut for decoding our DNA.

“The two concepts, the social and biological understandings of diversity, have been doing this sort of dance around each other, and sometimes they’re in productive juxtaposition. But oftentimes they’re entangled, and it’s just a mess.” 

- Johnathan Kahn, Professor of Law and Biology, Northeastern University

The use of race in research is becoming increasingly controversial. As a social construct, it continues to provide validity as a variable for social science studies. As a genetic biomarker, its value has been increasingly questioned on simple issues, such as the algorithm’s ability to predict renal and pulmonary disease. It has become even more problematic in genetic studies. A new report, based on the NIH’s “All of Us” Research Program, may be putting to bed any beliefs that we can categorize genetics and physiology along racial lines. 

“All of Us” is the longitudinal research program initiated in 2018 by the National Institutes of Health to advance precision medicine by collecting health data from over one million diverse participants across the United States. This new study, published in the American Journal of Human Genetics, is based on the “All of Us” biobank of genetic information on participants, the largest biobank in the US. Before jumping in, let’s get on the same page with some definitions.

• Race is self-reported, reflecting the “politically recognized definitions of race within the country used by the US Census.” It is a social construct if for no other reason than the categorization of race varies not only between countries but also among individuals.
• Ethnicity, a term seemingly closer to genetics, is also a social construct; in the US, we have two, Hispanic or non-Hispanic.
• Ancestry, based on genetic variations (alleles) found through our entire genome, is a genetic blueprint of our origins in human populations. It reflects our genetic inheritance, making it the most biologically relevant categorization. 

The researchers examined over 230,000 unrelated whole genomes collected by “All of Us,” focusing on 2 million common genetic variants (SNPs) to facilitate computational efficiency. They applied Principal Component Analysis (PCA), a statistical technique that identifies major statistical patterns of genetic variation, termed principal components (PCs), to map out population structure and individual genetic ancestry.

The researchers initially identified broad gradients of genetic variation rather than utilizing predetermined population-based clusters. By projecting their results onto global and other known reference panels, they could place participants in a worldwide context and assign “unknown” ancestry based on how their DNA aligned with established patterns.

Admixture analysis complemented PCA by digging deeper into the specific ancestral contributions within an individual’s genome, estimating the proportion of a person’s ancestry that comes from multiple historical source populations. Like a report from Ancestry.com, this technique quantifies our ancestral blend.

Among the findings:

• Human genetic variation doesn’t fit neatly into our racial and ethnic categories. There were five broad patterns, or principal components (PCs), identified; however, individuals do not fall into isolated, distinct genetic groups corresponding to their self-identified race and ethnicity. Ancestry is more nuanced and complex.
• We are indeed a global melting pot, home to a significant number of migrants from nearly every country and continent. The “All of Us” genetic diversity often exceeded global reference datasets, underscoring the genetic richness of our populations. Black or African American participants spanned a continuum between African and European ancestry. White participants exhibited dominant European ancestry, with detectable traces of South Asian, African, and Native American ancestry. Hispanic and Latino rarely identified with a specific racial category, and when they did, they occupied the entire range: African, Native American, and European.
• Admixture analysis, which identified 13 likely “global” ancestral clusters, revealed considerable variability in individual ancestral proportions within each self-identified race and ethnicity category. We are all mutts. [1]
• Those admixture proportions varied across US states, reflecting where we came from, voluntarily or involuntarily, and where we had moved once we arrived, e.g., The Great Migration or the migrations brought on by the Dust Bowl. Southern Whites more often came from Southern Europe, those in the Midwest from Northern Europe. Hispanic or Latino participants showed more Native American ancestry in the Southwest and more African ancestry in the Northeast (e.g., New York).

Throwing the Baby Out with the Bathwater

The analysis revealed that associations between ancestry and biological traits were attenuated when socio-cultural or environmental factors were taken into account. Biological characteristics, such as height and BMI, are shaped not only by genetic factors but also by a complex web of socio-environmental factors. While ancestry contributes meaningfully—North European and West-Central African ancestry, for example, were linked to taller height, while Native American and South Asian ancestries were associated with shorter stature—these patterns shifted when researchers factored in variables like income, education, Zip Code, and even country of birth. 

Adding self-identified race and ethnicity to their models improved predictions of traits like BMI and height, not because these categories represent genetics but because they help capture environmental and social influences, such as diet, stress, and access to care, that standard models often miss. For instance, Native American ancestry was linked to higher BMI, while East African ancestry showed the opposite trend, underscoring how subcontinental groups can have distinct and even opposing biological patterns.

Some takeaways

• Race and ethnicity, as used in surveys and the Census, reflect cultural and social identities—but don’t reliably capture our genetic ancestry
• The All of Us dataset does not fully capture all global ancestries. Some Native American, Middle Eastern, South Asian, and African hunter-gatherer groups remain underrepresented, highlighting the continued need for inclusive global sampling in genetic research.
• Genetic ancestry varies considerably within these groups and across different US regions, underscoring the need to assess fine-scale ancestries to control for confounding and advance precision medicine.
• To understand how genes influence health, we must also consider where people live, how they identify, and the environments that shape their lives.

The study underscores the importance of treating continental ancestry not as a single, uniform category but as a mosaic of distinct subcontinental ancestries, reflecting the rich regional variation within Africa, the Americas, Asia, and Europe. 

Race is a poor proxy for genetics, but in some instances, it serves as a better proxy for outcomes, especially when socioeconomic factors are the primary determinant. Separating genetic ancestry from social identity is neither simple nor always possible. Traits such as height and BMI are shaped by both inherited variants and the environments in which we live. Incorporating race and ethnicity into models isn’t a validation of race as biology; it’s a recognition that social categories encode real-world differences that affect health, even if they do so indirectly. 

The researchers recommend that future research adjust association models to prioritize direct measurement of environmental factors over using race or ethnicity as proxies—reserving such proxies only when no better data are available and their predictive value is empirically supported. Unfortunately, that may require a more nuanced understanding of how biology and society co-evolve than we currently possess. 

[1] Hispanic or Latino: ~50% European, ~31% Native American, ~13% African ancestry on average. Black or African American: ~83% African, ~14% European, with some showing majority-European ancestry. White: Mostly (~90%) European, with ~8% South Asian ancestry appearing in some. Middle Eastern or North African: ~66% European, ~26% South Asian ancestry. Asian: Primarily East (~68%) and South Asian (~25%) ancestry. Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander: Highly admixed, with ~37% East Asian ancestry.

 

Source: Subcontinental Genetic Variation In The All Of Us Research Program: Implications For Biomedical Research American Journal of Human Genetics DOI: 10.1016/j.ajhg.2025.04.012

Dr. Charles Dinerstein, M.D., MBA, FACS is Director of Medicine at the American Council on Science and Health. He has over 25 years of experience as a vascular surgeon.

https://www.acsh.org/news/2025/06/11/race-social-construct-or-genetic-biomarker-49543

Tennessee Sues US Department Of Education Over Hispanic Student Funding

 by Matthew Vadum via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

A civil rights lawsuit filed on June 11 in federal court for the Eastern District of Tennessee claims that a program providing federal money to colleges and universities if Hispanic students make up at least 25 percent of the student body is unconstitutional.

The U.S. Supreme Court in Washington on June 3, 2025. Madalina Vasiliu/The Epoch Times

The lawsuit was brought by the state of Tennessee and Students for Fair Admissions, a group whose lawsuit led the U.S. Supreme Court in 2023 to strike down the use of racial criteria in student admissions at institutions of higher learning in a case called Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard College.

Wednesday’s complaint names the U.S. Department of Education and Education Secretary Linda McMahon as defendants.

The plaintiffs argue that the federal government’s Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSI) grant program unconstitutionally discriminates based on race and ethnicity, according to the complaint.

The Education Department’s Hispanic-Serving Institutions Division provides “grant funding to institutions of higher education to assist with strengthening institutional programs, facilities, and services to expand the educational opportunities for Hispanic Americans and other underrepresented populations,” the Department of Education’s website states.

Congress appropriated $350.6 million for the program in fiscal 2024, education think tank New America reports.

The department may not discriminate on the basis of race or ethnicity, “even when Congress orders it to,” the complaint states.

Despite this, under the federal Higher Education Act the department allocates HSI program funding to colleges and universities only if they meet the “arbitrary ethnic threshold of 25 percent Hispanic” student enrollment, according to the complaint.

Tennessee operates a variety of colleges and universities, all of which serve Hispanic students and low-income students. “But not one of them qualifies to receive grants under the HSI program” because they don’t possess “the right mix of ethnicities on campus,” the complaint states.

“Funds should help needy students regardless of their immutable traits, and the denial of those funds harms students of all races,” according to the complaint.

In its current form, the program engages in “unconstitutional racial balancing” and operates outside the constitutional authority of Congress. The 25 percent minimum Hispanic enrollment provision functions as “a strict racial gatekeeper,” determining which schools may receive millions of dollars under the program, Students for Fair Admissions said in a statement.

Racial balancing is the practice of using race as a factor to seek proportional representation of racial groups in institutions such as schools. Even before its ruling in Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard College, the Supreme Court held that racial balancing policies must be weighed under the strict scrutiny standard, which means they must advance a compelling governmental interest and be narrowly tailored.

Tennessee argues the HSI program presents its schools with an impossible choice: they must either forgo millions of dollars in federal grants or participate in illegal racial balancing in admissions so they can boost Hispanic enrollment. A new state law specifically forbids race-based preferences in education, so now state schools are “at risk of violating either state or federal law no matter which direction they turn,” the statement said.

Students for Fair Admissions president Edward Blum said the HSI program is unconstitutional because it conditions receipt of government money on a student body’s racial composition.

The Supreme Court determined in the 2023 ruling that such practices are “patently unconstitutional.”

“Discriminating against colleges, universities, faculty, and students based on race violates the fundamental principle of equal protection under the law,” Blum said in a statement.

The Epoch Times reached out to the Department of Education for comment. No reply was received by publication time.

https://www.zerohedge.com/political/tennessee-sues-us-department-education-over-hispanic-student-funding

'Goldman Sachs trims 12-month US recession probability to 30%'

 Goldman Sachs on Thursday trimmed its U.S. recession probability to 30% from 35% for the next twelve months on easing uncertainty around President Donald Trump's tariff policies after the U.S. and China affirmed a trade deal.

Earlier this week, negotiators from Washington and Beijing agreed on a framework covering tariff rates with the deal seeing removal of Chinese export restrictions on rare earth minerals and giving Chinese students access to U.S. universities.

Investors breathed a sigh of relief following the deal and easing concerns of an economic recession, after Trump's "Liberation Day" tariffs on April 2 rattled global financial markets.

Goldman said domestic inflation readings so far – while offering only limited evidence – reflected a slightly smaller impact on U.S. consumer prices from tariffs.

Data on Wednesday showed consumer prices increased less than expected in May, but is expected to rise in the coming months on the back of Trump's import tariffs.

"Broad financial conditions have now eased back to roughly pre-tariff levels... (and) measures of trade policy uncertainty have moderated a bit following steps toward de-escalation," said Goldman, for nudging down its recession forecast.

The Wall Street brokerage also boosted its 2025 U.S. GDP growth prediction to 1.25% from its prior forecast of 1% on a quarterly basis.

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/goldman-sachs-trims-us-recession-134821147.html

J&J: Imbruvica shows promise in lymphocytic leukemia

 Johnson & Johnson announces that the combination of Imbruvica (ibrutinib) and venetoclax is more effective than the combination of acalabrutinib and venetoclaxnétoclax, in the treatment of chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) in first-line therapy, according to an indirect analysis (MAIC) presented at the EHA 2025 congress.

I+V reduces the risk of progression or death by 47% compared to A+V and achieves more responses with minimal residual disease (uMRD) three months after treatment.Final results from a Phase 2 study confirm the long-term clinical benefits of I+V, with progression-free survival and overall survival rates of 66% and 97% at 5.5 years.

Relapse occurred in 32% of patients, with no emergence of BTK or PLCG2 resistance mutations. No new safety signals were observed.Johnson & Johnson emphasizes that Imbruvica, validated by the longest follow-up in a fixed oral regimen, raises the standard of care for patients with CLL.

https://www.marketscreener.com/quote/stock/JOHNSON-JOHNSON-4832/news/J-J-Imbruvica-shows-promise-in-lymphocytic-leukemia-50225402/