A stray dog that spent her early life stealing tennis balls near a Blenheim park has earned a "chilled out retirement" after becoming one of the country's best drug dogs.In a rags to riches-style tale, Tasman the sniffer dog was...

A 56-year-old Johannesburg man was arrested during a roadblock at Calvinia in the Northern Cape this week for storing drugs in his spare tyre.

The US government began distributing remdesivir, an experimental drug recently approved for emergency use against Covid-19, to areas of the country struggling the most with the disease.The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) arranged for some 600,000 vials of Gilead Sciences’ antiviral medication, shown to reduce recovery times for some patients, to be shipped to health authorities in New Jersey, Illinois, Michigan and three other states, to treat an estimated 78,000 hospitalised…

PARIS: Researchers in Hong Kong have found that patients suffering milder illness caused by the new coronavirus recover more quickly if they are treated with a three-drug antiviral cocktail soon after symptoms appear.Authors of the study, published in the Lancet on Friday, described the findings...

Paris: Researchers in Hong Kong have found that patients suffering milder illness caused by the new coronavirus recover more quickly if they are treated with a three-drug antiviral cocktail soon after symptoms appear. Authors of the study, published in the Lancet on Friday, described the findings...

ISLAMABAD: The Asian Development Bank (ADB) under its ‘Supply Chain Finance Programme’ has dedicated $200 million to support companies that make and distribute medicines and other items needed to combat coronavirus in the developing member countries of the Bank.

The programme aims to stabilise the supply chain for products such as N95 marks, test kits, gloves, personal protective equipment (PPE) for healthcare providers, ventilators, hygiene items, and other critical goods.

The ADB assistance is targeted at channeling fund to manufacturers, their suppliers, and the distributors of critical goods through post-shipment post-acceptance finance, pre-shipment loans, and distributor financing.

Export bans of key materials have worsened the shortage of face masks in 22 economies, including Pakistan, Bangladesh, Canada, Czech Republic, Egypt, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Iran, Japan, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kenya, Malaysia, Poland, China, the Russian Federation, the Republic of Korea, Taipei, Thailand and Ukraine. The export bans are in place in these economies since March 18.

Pakistan among nations that faced shortage of masks due to ban on export

A $800m increase in ADB’s Trade Finance Programme will also be mobilised and along with the increase in capital comes flexibility to support domestic and cross-border trade in times of emergency. The programme is an effective crisis response vehicle because it has strong relationships with many banks, both inside developing Asia and globally, the latter particularly helpful to mobilise co-financing, involving private sector resources to leverage the impact of ADB’s direct support.

An ADB report says that surging demand, partly joined with panic buying, hoarding, and misuse of PPE amid the Covid-19 pandemic, is disrupting global supplies and putting lives at risk. Demand has surged, overwhelming global production capacity.

The dramatic rise in demand for surgical masks, goggles, gloves, and gowns has depleted stockpiles, prompted significant price increases, and led to production backlogs of 4 to 6 months in fulfilling orders.

The most significant challenge is to ensure that critical PPE products are sourced and allocated to frontline health workers and other responders in affected countries, especially those most vulnerable to the spread of coronavirus.

The global market for PPE in the health sector was estimated to be worth $2.5 billion in 2018. Gloves have the highest share of sales revenues at 25 per cent, followed by suits or coveralls at 22pc. Face masks and hats came in third with a share of 14pc.

By region, the United States had the largest market share (33pc), followed by Asia and the Pacific (28pc), and Europe (22pc) in 2018.

The PPE supply chain has not been properly functioning to meet a surge in demand due to the constraints in production and logistics. Prices of PPE products have risen dramatically since the beginning of the Covid-19 outbreak: a six-fold increase for surgical masks; threefold for respirators; and a doubling in the price of gowns.

Among the major sources of the identified backlogs in the production and distribution of PPE, with a focus on face masks, are transport and shipping constraints caused by roadblocks and quarantine measures, and lower availability of transportation and freight containers, hoarding, profiteering, and limited workforce capacity due to illness, also contribute to the shortage.

Published in Dawn, May 10th, 2020

Coronavirus crisis reveals weakness in supply chain as medicines in export ban rise from 29 to 196 this year

• Coronavirus – latest updates
• See all our coronavirus coverage

NHS leaders and medical charities are calling for ministers to bring more drug manufacturing to the UK to reduce the risk of future shortages after the problems seen during the coronavirus crisis.

In addition to the well documented shortages of personal protective equipment, dealing with Covid-19 has placed huge strain on supplies of intensive care medicine, over-the-counter drugs and oxygen. The NHS has been forced to put new rationing measures in place to ensure hospitals do not run out.

The supply chain isn’t as good – isn’t as robust – as it could be

A two-week course of antiviral therapy that combines the power of three drugs has shown promise in treating hospitalised patients with mild to moderate COVID-19 in a carefully undertaken phase 2 clinical trial.

The results of the trial, published in the journal The Lancet, involved 127 adults from six public hospitals in Hong Kong.

The drug combination tested in the trial included interferon beta-1b, which was developed to treat multiple sclerosis (MS), and lopinavir-ritonavir, which is normally used to treat HIV and ribavirin, an oral hepatitis C virus drug.

The findings of the phase two trial provided evidence that early treatment with triple antiviral therapy alongside standard care is safe and shortens duration of viral shedding (when the virus is detectable and potentially transmissible) compared to lopinavir-ritonavir alone—average seven days vs 12 days—in patients with mild to moderate COVID-19.

"Our trial demonstrates that early treatment of mild to moderate COVID-19 with a triple combination of antiviral drugs may rapidly suppress the amount of virus in a patient's body, relieve symptoms, and reduce the risk to healthcare workers by reducing the duration and quantity of viral shedding," said professor Kwok-Yung Yuen from the University of Hong Kong who led the research.

No new cases in Hong Kong as restrictions ease

Hong Kong recorded no new COVID-19 case on Saturday, a day after the city eased restrictions. Saturday was also the 20th day in a row with no local infections. Health experts earlier suggested that Hong Kong could be considered to be free of local transmission if there were no such cases after 28 days.

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High-resolution pictures or atomic-level detail of chikungunya virus interacting with a protein found on the cell surface in the joints was snapped by

The proliferation of high-cost medicines and rising drug prices are increasing pressures on public health spending and calling into question the pharmaceutical industry’s pricing strategies.

Jessica Ennis-Hill has not given up hope of becoming a three-time world champion as she waits for the gold medal she was denied in 2011 by a drugs cheat.

Jessica Ennis-Hill's coach has told Sebastian Coe to immediately start drawing up a list of medals that should be taken from drug cheats and handed to the athletes they robbed.

Drug major Dr Reddy's Laboratories is recalling 1,752 bottles of generic heartburn medicine in the US after the American health regulator found quality issues with the product. As per the latest Enforcement Report by the the US Food and Drug Administration (USFDA), the Hyderabad-based drug firm is voluntarily recalling 1,752 bottles (1,000 count) of 40 mg Esomeprazole Magnesium delayed release capsules in the US. The ongoing Class III recall is on account of "Discolouration" and because the product contains brown pellets, USFDA said. As per the US health regulator, a class III recall is initiated in a situation "in which use of or exposure to a violative product is not likely to cause adverse health consequences". The recalled product lot has been manufactured at Dr Reddy's Bachupally manufacturing facility in Telangana and is being recalled by the company's US-based arm. Esomeprazole Magnesium delayed release capsules are indicated to reduce the amount of acid in the stomach and ...

The US Department of Health and Human Services announced that it is delivering drug remdesivir to Illinois, New Jersey, Michigan, Connecticut, Maryland and Iowa.

Berlin, May 5: Several drugs approved for the treatment of hepatitis C viral infection have been identified as potential candidates against COVID-19 caused by the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus, according to a study based on extensive calculations using supercomputer simulations.

Washington, May 07: A Chinese medical researcher on the "verge of making very significant" coronavirus findings has been found shot dead in the US state of Pennsylvania, media reports said on Wednesday. University of Pittsburgh professor Bing Liu, 37, was found

The world is together in the fight against the global pandemic of coronavirus or covid-19, which has 1,700,870 cases and caused 102,789 deaths since its advent in December 2019. With hundreds of medical agencies and health experts crucially working on the

Scientists and medical research facilities around the world are jointly working towards developing a vaccine for the coronavirus pandemic which has caused 114,270 deaths and a total of 1,853,604 cases as of today [1]. From hydroxychloroquine to HIV drugs,

An experimental antiviral drug developed by a research-based biopharmaceutical company, Gilead Sciences showed positive results on its application, where more than half of a group of severely ill coronavirus patients improved. UPDATE: On 29 April, Gilead Sciences Inc. announced that in Phase

Psychotropic drugs seized in city

Pfizer and German partner BioNTech SE (22UAy.F) said on Tuesday they have begun delivering doses of their coronavirus vaccine candidates for initial human testing in the United States.

The study, however, concluded that HCQ had no potential harm either.

The title compound (systematic name: bis­{2-[4-(acet­yloxy)-1H-indol-3-yl]ethan-1-aminium} but-2-enedioate), 2C14H19N2O2+·C4H2O42−, has a single protonated psilacetin cation and one half of a fumarate dianion in the asymmetric unit. There are N—H⋯O hydrogen bonds between the ammonium H atoms and the fumarate O atoms, as well as N—H⋯O hydrogen bonds between the indole H atoms and the fumarate O atoms. The hydrogen bonds hold the ions together in infinite one-dimensional chains along [111].

This study is an investigation into the crystal structure of the biologically active drug mol­ecule riluzole [RZ, 6-(tri­fluoro­meth­oxy)-1,3-benzo­thia­zol-2-amine], C8H5F3N2OS, and its derivative, the riluzolium chloride salt [RZHCl, 2-amino-6-(tri­fluoro­meth­oxy)-1,3-benzo­thia­zol-3-ium chloride], C8H6F3N2OS+·Cl−. In spite of repeated efforts to crystallize the drug, its crystal structure has not been reported to date, hence the current study provides a method for obtaining crystals of both riluzole and its corresponding salt, riluzolium hydro­chloride. The salt was obtained by grinding HCl with the drug and crystallizing the obtained solid from di­chloro­methane. The crystals of riluzole were obtained in the presence of l-glutamic acid and d-glutamic acid in separate experiments. In the crystal structure of RZHCl, the –OCF3 moiety is perpendicular to the mol­ecular plane containing the riluzolium ion, as can be seen by the torsion angle of 107.4 (3)°. In the case of riluzole, the torsion angles of the four different mol­ecules in the asymmetric unit show that in three cases the tri­fluoro­meth­oxy group is perpendicular to the riluzole mol­ecular plane and only in one mol­ecule does the –OCF3 group lie in the same mol­ecular plane. The crystal structure of riluzole primarily consists of strong N—H⋯N hydrogen bonds along with weak C—H⋯F, C—H⋯S, F⋯F, C⋯C and C⋯S inter­actions, while that of its salt is stabilized by strong [N—H]+⋯Cl− and weak C—H⋯Cl−, N—H⋯S, C—H⋯F, C⋯C, S⋯N and S⋯Cl− inter­actions.

Crystal structures are reported for N-(4-meth­oxy­phen­yl)piperazine (MeOPP), (I), and for its 3,5-di­nitro­benzoate, 2,4,6-tri­nitro­phenolate (picrate) and 4-amino­benzoate salts, (II)–(IV), the last of which crystallizes as a monohydrate. In MeOPP, C11H16N2O, (I), the 4-meth­oxy­phenyl group is nearly planar and it occupies an equatorial site on the piperazine ring: the mol­ecules are linked into simple C(10) chains by N—H⋯O hydrogen bonds. In each of the salts, i.e., C11H17N2O+·C7H3N2O6−, (II), C11H17N2O+·C6H2N3O7−, (III), and C11H17N2O+·C7H6NO2−·H2O, (IV), the effectively planar 4-meth­oxy­phenyl substituent again occupies an equatorial site on the piperazine ring. In (II), two of the nitro groups are disordered over two sets of atomic sites and the bond distances in the anion indicate considerable delocalization of the negative charge over the C atoms of the ring. The ions in (II) are linked by two N—H⋯O hydrogen bonds to form a cyclic, centrosymmetric four-ion aggregate; those in (III) are linked by a combination of N—H⋯O and C—H⋯π(arene) hydrogen bonds to form sheets; and the components of (IV) are linked by N—H⋯O, O—H⋯O and C—H⋯π(arene) hydrogen bonds to form a three-dimensional framework structure. Comparisons are made with the structures of some related compounds.

The title compound, C24H18FNO3, crystallizes in the monoclinic centrosymmetric space group P21/n and its mol­ecular conformation is stabilized via C—H⋯O intra­molecular inter­actions. The supra­molecular network mainly comprises C—H⋯O, C—H⋯F and C—H⋯π inter­actions, which contribute towards the formation of the crystal structure. The different inter­molecular inter­actions have been further analysed via Hirshfeld surface analysis and fingerprint plots.

Rational structure-based drug design (SBDD) relies on the availability of a large number of co-crystal structures to map the ligand-binding pocket of the target protein and use this information for lead-compound optimization via an iterative process. While SBDD has proven successful for many drug-discovery projects, its application to G protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs) has been limited owing to extreme difficulties with their crystallization. Here, a method is presented for the rapid determination of multiple co-crystal structures for a target GPCR in complex with various ligands, taking advantage of the serial femtosecond crystallography approach, which obviates the need for large crystals and requires only submilligram quantities of purified protein. The method was applied to the human β2-adrenergic receptor, resulting in eight room-temperature co-crystal structures with six different ligands, including previously unreported structures with carvedilol and propranolol. The generality of the proposed method was tested with three other receptors. This approach has the potential to enable SBDD for GPCRs and other difficult-to-crystallize membrane proteins.

The non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs mefenamic acid (MFA) and tolfenamic acid (TFA) have a close resemblance in their molecular scaffold, whereby a methyl group in MFA is substituted by a chloro group in TFA. The present study demonstrates the isomorphous nature of these compounds in a series of their multicomponent solids. Furthermore, the unique nature of MFA and TFA has been demonstrated while excavating their alternate solid forms in that, by varying the drug (MFA or TFA) to coformer [4-di­methyl­amino­pyridine (DMAP)] stoichiometric ratio, both drugs have produced three different types of multicomponent crystals, viz. salt (1:1; API to coformer ratio), salt hydrate (1:1:1) and cocrystal salt (2:1). Interestingly, as anticipated from the close similarity of TFA and MFA structures, these multicomponent solids have shown an isomorphous relation. A thorough characterization and structural investigation of the new multicomponent forms of MFA and TFA revealed their similarity in terms of space group and structural packing with isomorphic nature among the pairs. Herein, the experimental results are generalized in a broader perspective for predictably identifying any possible new forms of comparable compounds by mapping their crystal structure landscapes. The utility of such an approach is evident from the identification of polymorph VI of TFA from hetero-seeding with isomorphous MFA form I from acetone–methanol (1:1) solution. That aside, a pseudopolymorph of TFA with di­methyl­formamide (DMF) was obtained, which also has some structural similarity to that of the solvate MFA:DMF. These new isostructural pairs are discussed in the context of solid form screening using structural landscape similarity.

Apoptosis is a crucial process by which multicellular organisms control tissue growth, removal and inflammation. Disruption of the normal apoptotic function is often observed in cancer, where cell death is avoided by the overexpression of anti-apoptotic proteins of the Bcl-2 (B-cell lymphoma 2) family, including Mcl-1 (myeloid cell leukaemia 1). This makes Mcl-1 a potential target for drug therapy, through which normal apoptosis may be restored by inhibiting the protective function of Mcl-1. Here, the discovery and biophysical properties of an anti-Mcl-1 antibody fragment are described and the utility of both the scFv and Fab are demonstrated in generating an Mcl-1 crystal system amenable to iterative structure-guided drug design.

A putative open reading frame encoding GTP cyclohydrolase I from Listeria monocytogenes was expressed in a recombinant Escherichia coli strain. The recombinant protein was purified and was confirmed to convert GTP to dihydroneopterin triphosphate (Km = 53 µM; vmax = 180 nmol mg−1 min−1). The protein was crystallized from 1.3 M sodium citrate pH 7.3 and the crystal structure was solved at a resolution of 2.4 Å (Rfree = 0.226) by molecular replacement using human GTP cyclohydrolase I as a template. The protein is a D5-symmetric decamer with ten topologically equivalent active sites. Screening a small library of about 9000 compounds afforded several inhibitors with IC50 values in the low-micromolar range. Several inhibitors had significant selectivity with regard to human GTP cyclohydrolase I. Hence, GTP cyclohydrolase I may be a potential target for novel drugs directed at microbial infections, including listeriosis, a rare disease with high mortality.

“Spinning under the influence” is one way to describe recent activities in the Costa Rican laboratory of Smithsonian scientist William Eberhard. An entomologist at the Smithsonian’s Tropical Research Institute, Eberhard recently carried out a series of experiments in which he observed the web-building behavior of dozens of spiders under the influence of drugs—specifically, a chemical injected into their bodies by parasitic wasps.

The post Drugged spiders’ web spinning may hold keys to understanding animal behavior appeared first on Smithsonian Insider.

File: (L-R) "The Sarah Silverman Program" writer Harris Wittels, comedian Sarah Silverman, executive producer/head writer Dan Sterling and actress Laura Silverman, arrive at Comedy Central's Emmy Awards party at the STK restaurant Sept. 21, 2008 in Los Angeles.; Credit: Ethan Miller/Getty Images

Harris Wittels, a comedy writer who worked on "Parks & Recreation," has died at 30, the Los Angeles Police Department's Jane Kim tells KPCC.

Wittels was discovered by his assistant around 12 p.m., Kim said, and was already dead. Kim said that Wittels' death was a possible overdose, but that the Coroner's Office would determine the cause of death. Wittels had attended drug rehab twice.

Comedy Central, where Wittels worked on "The Sarah Silverman Program" and "Secret Girlfriend," confirmed Wittels' death, as did the comedy show he appeared at Wednesday night.

Comedy Central tweet

Meltdown Show tweet

Wittels was also well known for his @Humblebrag Twitter account and later book, helping to popularize the idea online of the false modesty of bragging while trying not to look like you're bragging.

Wittels had spoken about his struggles with addiction in places including Pete Holmes's podcast "You Made It Weird" in a November episode.

"I just really stopped caring about my life," Wittels said on "You Made It Weird," explaining how he got into doing drugs. "I just really started to think, well, if I'm only here for 80 years, then who cares if I spend it high or not?"

Wittels received his first big break when Sarah Silverman saw him performing comedy and gave him a job writing for her Comedy Central show.

Wittels also wrote for HBO's "Eastbound & Down," several MTV awards shows and the American Music Awards. He had a recurring role on "Parks & Recreation" and was a regular guest on the "Comedy Bang Bang" podcast.

Comedians, actors and fans mourned Wittels' death online.

Harris Wittels Storify

See Wittels in a scene from "Parks & Recreation":

Wittels on Parks & Recreation

Listen to Wittels on "Comedy Bang Bang":

Wittels on Comedy Bang Bang

This story has been updated.

This content is from Southern California Public Radio. View the original story at SCPR.org.

Marijuanas active components are potentially effective in treating pain, nausea, the anorexia of AIDS wasting, and other symptoms, and should be tested rigorously in clinical trials.

Medication errors are among the most common medical errors, harming at least 1.5 million people every year, says a new report from the Institute of Medicine of the National Academies.