San Francisco Chronicle (July 13)
“A vaccine may not be enough to end the coronavirus pandemic and restore society to some semblance of normalcy.” Effective treatments may prove just as important. “Researchers across the globe are racing to find drugs that can keep more people alive and out of the hospital—and any one of those treatments may ultimately work just as well as a vaccine.”
Tags: Alive, Coronavirus, Drugs, Effective, Hospital, Normalcy, Pandemic, Researchers, Restore, Society, Treatments, Vaccine
Wall Street Journal (May 15)
“It is always hard anticipating successful drugs, but those wagering on coronavirus treatments face unique challenges. Some of the most innovative and promising approaches are wholly unproven. Companies are competing with foreign nations and not-for-profit organizations determined to achieve their own breakthroughs. Successful drugs or vaccines may run into pricing, manufacturing and distribution difficulties.” Issues like these explain why “big investors aren’t betting it all on a coronavirus cure.”
Tags: Breakthroughs, Challenges, Coronavirus, Distribution, Drugs, Innovative, Manufacturing, NPOs, Pricing, Unproven, Vaccines
Financial Times (August 1)
Wall Street is enthusiastic about all things pet. “The growth of pet versions of everything from health food to personal service and new drugs is luring investors.” For example, “Zoetis, the animal pharmaceuticals company, has strongly outperformed its former owner Pfizer since being spun off in 2013; shares in Chewy, the online pet supplies retailer rose by 50 per cent on its first day of trading in June.” Consistency makes the pet industry stand out. The sum Americans spend on pets “has risen steadily at around 5 per cent annually for two decades, even following the 2008 financial crisis, when people bought less for themselves.”
Tags: Chewy, Drugs, Enthusiastic, Health food, Investors, Personal service, Pfizer, Pharmaceuticals, Wall Street, Zoetis
The Guardian (November 18)
“Last-line antibiotics against serious pneumonia and bloodstream infections are under real threat in Europe as resistant strains of bacteria emerge…. Particularly worrying is the increase in resistance to antibiotics considered the last line, where there are no new drugs to treat patients with certain serious infections.”
Tags: Antibiotics, Bacteria, Bloodstream, Drugs, Europe, Infections, Last-line, Patients, Pneumonia, Resistance
Chicago Tribune (October 9)
While “most of the world has remained silent,” Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte has engaged in sweeping genocide. “Nearly 3,000 people have already been gunned down, either by police or vigilante death squads, encouraged by Duterte, who has promised immunity.” Another 600,000 are “now caged in hideously crowded prisons that already look like concentration camps.” This may be “the logical conclusion of the brutal rhetoric of the drug war,” but “history shows that such dehumanization doesn’t stop crime or drug use — it simply enables it.”
Tags: Concentration camps, Crime, Dehumanization, Drug war, Drugs, Duterte, Genocide, Immunity, Philippines, Prison, Silent, Vigilante death squads
New York Times (May 11)
“Antibiotics have transformed medicine and saved countless lives over the past seven decades. Now, rampant overuse and the lack of new drugs in the pipeline threatens to undermine their effectiveness.” The last new class of antibiotics emerged in 1987. Today both standard-treatment and last-resort antibiotics often fail due to growing resistance in germs and bacteria.
Tags: Antibiotics, Bacteria, Drugs, Effectiveness, Germs, Lives, Medicine, Overuse, Pipeline, Resistance