The disappointing benefit seen in Pfizer Inc.’s clinical study of Paxlovid (nirmatrelvir and ritonavir) in standard-risk COVID-19 patients suggests that even if the drug was authorized or approved for patients at standard risk as well as those at high risk of hospitalization and death, the oral antiviral is unlikely to get much uptake in the lower-risk population.
Pfizer’s Paxlovid Likely Relegated To High-Risk COVID-19 Patients
The company announced updated results from a standard-risk study, which it will include in its overall new drug application, but whether Paxlovid will see approval or uptake in that group is another question.

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Kostaive is the first self-amplifying mRNA COVID-19 vaccine to receive approval from the European Commission and could provide serious competition to Pfizer/BioNTech's Comirnaty and Moderna's Spikevax.
A week after a downbeat forecast at J.P. Morgan Healthcare Conference, the US mRNA specialist has pocketed another sizeable sum from the US Department of Health and Human Services to accelerate development of an H5N1 mRNA pandemic influenza vaccine.
Pfizer’s and Moderna’s quarterly pandemic-related product sales could not mask other weaknesses while GSK’s quarter was marred by unimpressive non-pandemic vaccines sales.
Japanese distributor Meiji Seika Pharma is considering possible legal action against what it views as online slander around COVID-19 vaccine Kostaive, which received its global-first approval in Japan last year and has now been launched for regular vaccination in the country.
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CEO Kris Elverum told Scrip about the start-up’s platform for editing RNA to correct genetic variants that cause harm and to reproduce healthy variants as a means of treating disease.
The study’s failure in the overall MDD population was not a surprise, but solriamfetol’s efficacy in MDD with EDS provided a rationale for testing it in that subpopulation.
Pharma executives and investors are waiting with bated breath to find out if President Trump will include drugs in a new round of tariffs to be announced on 2 April.