Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Sackler Family Members May Face Lawsuit From Purdue Pharma Creditors
Reuters: Purdue Creditors Seek Approval To Sue Sackler Family Members
Purdue Pharma's creditors sought permission from a U.S. bankruptcy court on Monday to sue the company's wealthy owners, arguing that the litigation can serve as both a negotiating tool and a fallback option as the OxyContin maker re-starts talks on a bankruptcy settlement. Purdue is going back to the drawing board to negotiate a comprehensive settlement of lawsuits against it and its Sackler family owners alleging that the company's deceptive marketing of OxyContin spurred an opioid addiction crisis in the U.S. A U.S. Supreme Court decision last month upended a previous bankruptcy deal. (Knauth, 7/8)
Reuters: Abbott Faces Trial Over Claims That Preterm Infant Formula Caused Dangerous Disease
Similac baby formula maker Abbott is expected to face a trial on Monday over claims that its formula for preterm infants used in neonatal intensive care units causes a potentially deadly bowel disease, the second trial out of hundreds of similar lawsuits in the United States. Lawyers for the company and for Illinois resident Margo Gill will make their opening statements to jurors in St. Louis, Missouri, and the trial is expected to last most of the rest of the month. Gill alleges in the lawsuit that her premature infant child developed necrotizing enterocolitis (NEC) as a result of being fed Abbott's products for premature babies. (Pierson, 7/8)
Los Angeles Times: Mounjaro Bests Ozempic For Weight Loss In Comparison Of Real-World Use
The researchers who conducted the analysis also found that compared with people on Ozempic, those on Mounjaro were 2.5 times more likely to lose at least 10% of their initial weight and more than three times as likely to lose at least 15% of their weight during their first year on the medications. The findings were published Monday in JAMA Internal Medicine. (Kaplan, 7/8)
Stat: A Faster, Cheaper Cancer Cell Therapy Is To Be Tested In Humans
In a long-awaited study, patients in Australia will soon receive an IV infusion designed to transform their own immune cells into swarms of cancer-fighting drones. The trial, announced on Tuesday by Interius Biotherapeutics, will be the first to test what’s known technically as in vivo CAR-T therapy. Researchers have long hoped the approach could provide a potentially cheaper, safer, and more scalable version of the cell therapies that are curative for some blood cancer patients but remain out of reach for many. (Mast, 7/9)
KFF Health News: From Dr. Oz To Heart Valves: A Tiny Device Charted A Contentious Path Through The FDA
In 2013, the FDA approved an implantable device to treat leaky heart valves. Among its inventors was Mehmet Oz, the former television personality and former U.S. Senate candidate widely known as “Dr. Oz.” In online videos, Oz has called the process that brought the MitraClip device to market an example of American medicine firing “on all cylinders,” and he has compared it to “landing a man on the moon.” (Hilzenrath and Hacker, 7/9)
