Vaccines Archives - HEALTH & LIFE SCIENCES NEWS

CDC Issues Guidance for Employer-Operated Vaccination Sites

by Jennifer S. Geetter | Mar 19, 2021 | Hospital Health Benefits, Hospitals & Health Systems

As states across the US expand COVID-19 vaccine eligibility, employers are well-positioned to facilitate vaccine access and improve distribution efficiency. One critical way for employers to achieve these goals is through the operation of workplace vaccination sites, sometimes called closed points of dispensing (CPODs).

On March 16, 2021, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) issued updated guidance on workplace vaccination programs. Among other recommendations, the CDC encourages some employers to implement workplace COVID-19 vaccination sites and outlines best practices for doing so.

According to the CDC, employers with (1) a large number of workers on predictable schedules, (2) the ability to enroll as a vaccination provider or engage an already enrolled vaccination provider, and (3) enough space to operate a vaccination clinic that allows for social distancing should consider operating an on-site vaccination program. Conversely, the CDC recommends an off-site vaccination program for small- or medium-sized employers with a mobile workforce on variable schedules.

The CDC provides several options for employers that choose to operate an on-site vaccination program, including existing occupational health clinics, employer-run temporary vaccination clinics, and mobile vaccination clinics brought to the workplace. Regardless of the model, the CDC advises employers to contact their local health department for guidance. Many jurisdictions have already embraced the CPOD model (e.g. Chicago, IL) and provide extensive information on their websites.

The updated CDC guidance makes clear workplace vaccination clinics should [...]

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Lawsuits Don’t Make Vaccines… and Other Lessons from AstraZeneca’s Agreement with the EU Commission

by Katya Ascher | Feb 4, 2021 | International Health

Key Take-Away: To avoid ambiguity, parties drafting manufacture and supply agreements should explicitly set out the factors that they deem relevant in assessing a party’s efforts. The manufacturing party may wish to explicitly mention its commitments to other purchasers and expected technical difficulties. This is particularly true in the field of biotechnology where problems in development and early stages of production are common

Vaccines are finally offering hope that the COVID-19 pandemic, which has claimed millions of lives and bulldozed the way we lived “before,” will come to a halt. However, even as the efficacy data is reported and companies obtain regulatory approval, there is another hurdle: global demand far outstrips production capacity.

In this febrile context, AstraZeneca has announced that due to production problems at a Belgian site, it will not deliver to EU member states the expected number of doses of its vaccine, which was granted a conditional marketing authorization in the EU on January 29, 2021. To bolster its contention that AstraZeneca is in violation of its obligation to supply the scheduled doses of vaccines, the EU Commission published a redacted version of the Advance Purchase Agreement for the Production, Purchase and Supply of a COVID-19 Vaccine in the European Union (the APA), which the Commission negotiated and signed on behalf of Member States on August 27, 2020.

What does the agreement say about AstraZeneca’s obligations to supply the vaccines? And what lessons can be gleaned for those negotiating manufacturing and supply agreements in the field?

What are the Life Science Transaction Trends in the Wake of the Sanitary Crisis?

by Emmanuelle Trombe | Jul 29, 2020 | Health M&A, Health Private Equity, Life Sciences, Life Sciences Private Equity

In the second installment of McDermott’s webinar series, HPE Europe 2020: What are the Life Science Transaction Trends in the Wake of the Sanitary Crisis?, moderator and McDermott partner Emmanuelle Trombe and industry experts Joseph El Khoury of Natixis, Cédric Garcia of EY’s Life Science Group, Dr. Erich Tauber of Themis Bioscience and Daniel Teper of CYTOVIA Therapeutics shared lessons learned from the first half of 2020, when COVID-19 changed the world. The panelists also discussed the outlook for life sciences transaction trends in the second half of the year and beyond.

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