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Donald Trump is now the second person in American history to win two non-consecutive Presidential terms, having presumptively secured victory in the race last night. Here’s a few initial thoughts about what that might mean for the healthcare industry.
More M&A Activity: Although Trump’s first term had more aggressive antitrust activity than a typical Republican administration, Wall Street widely expects a second Trump term to be more conducive to acquisitions. “This should lift whatever overhang exists from the current administration seeking to block some larger acquisitions by pharmaceutical firms, which should increase M&A activity,” Niels Peetz-Larsen, partner at HighVista Strategies, said in a note.
Possible Slowdown In Biotech Investment: Trump’s win led to a spike in bond yields and the value of the dollar, a sign that investors expect higher deficits and debt in a second Trump Administration. That’s bad for biotech stocks, Peetz-Larsen said, as they “tend to be interest rate sensitive given their ongoing funding needs.” (This impact would probably not be seen in big pharma stocks, however, according to a note from Jefferies.)
Tariffs Might Raise Drug Prices: One of Trump’s consistent promises is an across-the-board tariff on goods, which will likely make everything more expensive. That’s a category that includes pharmaceuticals. In 2023, the U.S. imported nearly $180 billion worth of drugs last year, according to the United Nations. The price inflation that results will also likely keep interest rates high, which might exacerbate issues with biotech investment.
The Unknown Role of RFK, Jr.: Last week, Trump promised that he would let Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. “go wild” on health in his administration. It’s not clear what role that would exactly entail, but Kennedy is a well-known proponent of false scientific claims against vaccination, use of antidepressants and fluoride in drinking water.
“It would be deeply concerning to have RFK hold any federally appointed office with oversight of medical matters and public health concerns,” vaccine developer Centivax CEO Jacob Glanville said in an email, noting that Kennedy’s health claims are “far outside the expert opinion of the vast majority of the medical establishment.”
This AI Model Could Keep Thousands Of Cancer Patients From Getting Unnecessary Treatments
One of the challenges of treating cancers is that they aren’t created equal. Some are fast and aggressive, others slow with lower risk. It’s often difficult to tell which is which, challenging to guide the course of treatment and leading to therapies whose risks outweigh the dangers of the cancer. There are some lab tests that can help, but it can take days or weeks to get results and their usefulness is sometimes specific to patients with specific genetic mutations.
Jan Witowski wants to change this. His company, Ataraxis, has developed an AI-powered diagnostic test, Ataraxis Breast, that can accurately assess whether a breast cancer is high risk or low risk , giving doctors insight as to whether a patient needs aggressive treatment. In a recent study, the company said that its system could be up to 30% more accurate than the current standard of care used in many hospitals today.
“If you don’t benefit from chemotherapy, you want to avoid it,” CEO Witowski said. “And we show in the study and more broadly that we’re able to avoid unnecessary chemotherapy in potentially tens of thousands more breast cancer patients every year.”
Read the whole story
Pipeline & Deal Updates
Obesity: Novo Nordisk has secured an exclusive license from Ascendis Pharma for use of its TransCon platform to produce drugs for obesity and other metabolic disorders, such as the company’s lead program in a GLP-1 drug that only needs to be taken monthly. Ascendis will be eligible for up to $285 million plus royalties, with other payments for each additional program.
Breast cancer: AI mammography company CureMetrix has entered an agreement with SimonMed imaging to incorporate its AI software cmAgnio, an FDA cleared program that can read mammograms.
Inflammatory Diseases: Evommune, which is developing treatments against chronic inflammatory diseases, announced it has raised a $115 million series C round aimed at moving its drug candidates through the clinical pipeline.
How AI Will Make It Easier To Understand Your Dental X-Rays
Sometimes at the end of a dental appointment, the dentist shows you a X-ray, points to an unremarkable spot on it and explains why it means you need a particular procedure. And many of us just nod along, with zero idea of what, exactly, it is we’re looking at.
This is one reason, suggests Overjet CEO Wardah Inam, why patients opt out of recommended dental procedures more than half the time. “Patient’s don’t accept them because they don’t understand what the dentist is saying,” she said.
Her company hopes to change this with the commercial launch of its smart imaging system, Iris. This system uses the company’s AI platform, which has been trained on millions of dental images, to sharpen blurry X-ray images and add color and other visualizations to more clearly highlight potential dental health issues.
“We see these as smart imaging,” Inam, 37, said. “It doesn’t just capture images, it understands the images it’s capturing and applies AI findings based on that.”
Read more here.
Other Healthcare News
Google DeepMind’s John Jumper On Winning The Nobel Prize And The Future Of AlphaFold
Abortion Ballot Results: Florida And Nebraska Reject New Protections, Montana Passes Abortion Rights Amendment
Bright Light Therapy Might Help In Treating Depressive Disorders: Study
Healthcare Labor Woes Are Subsiding, But Doctor Offices Still Swamped
Promising Schizophrenia Drug, Cobenfy, Will Likely Face Access Challenges
New CVS Health CEO Shakes Up Management, Commits To Integrated Model
Across Forbes
What Else We are Reading
These 7 watchdogs scour scientific papers for problems — and often find them (Stat)
Why has NIH’s dental institute director been missing for 6 months? (Science)
Misinformation Really Does Spread like a Virus, Epidemiology Shows (Scientific American)
