Dear clients and friends: Given your interest in health and medicine, we would like to share with you our collection of the most interesting perspectives on our industry's trends and developments. We are happy to share them with you — and hope you share your thoughts with us.

Here’s to yuletide cheer and fewer discussions about the weather!

1. Opening (and Closing) the Gates

The Gates Foundation will “close its doors permanently” in 20 years. In his latest letter, Bill Gates not only pledged to “double our giving to…more than $200 billion between now and 2045,” but to expand focus beyond communicable diseases to invest in Alzheimer’s:

Alzheimer’s is a growing crisis here in the United States, and as life expectancies go up, it threatens to become a massive burden to both families and healthcare systems around the world. Fortunately, scientists are currently making amazing progress to slow and even stop the progress of this disease. I expect to keep supporting their efforts as long as it’s necessary.

2. EU Regulation Blues

 The CEOs of Novartis and Sanofi are not happy with the biopharmaceutical marketplace in the European Union. In a co-written letter to the FT, they urge the European Commission to create policies to “strength Europe’s domestic market”:

 European price controls and austerity measures reduce the attractiveness of its markets. Launch prices are suppressed, patented medicines’ growth capped, and prices reduced when new applications are found. The US and China are finding ways to incentivise innovation, while Europe is penalising it. Recent data shows that over 30 per cent of medicines approved in the US were not available in Europe after two years. Over time it is inevitable that clinical trials and R&D will further shift to the US and China.

3. Prescriptions from Politicians

 The MAHA Commission report will soon arrive. Its remit extends far beyond banning the dyes that make Froot Loops electric blue. Pharma watchers have their eyes peeled on changes to DTC, FDA applications, and mental health. The ADHD community, in particular, is on edge. ADDitude, an online ADHD hub, received multiple notes of concern from its members:

 “This sets us back at least 10 years in mental health care. Referring to any therapeutic treatment as a potential ‘threat’ not only worsens stigma but propagates complete misinformation.”

“MAHA will probably limit which medications are covered by insurance or Medicaid, making life unaffordable and unbearable for many neurodivergent people who are relying on them just to get through each day.”

“Politicians should not be interfering with medication access or making decisions on what is or isn’t safe. That’s what the FDA is for.”

4. FD-AI

The FDA is greenlighting an AI pilot to support scientific reviewers. FDA Commissioner Makary says it’ll speed things up:

I was blown away by the success of our first AI-assisted scientific review pilot. We need to value our scientists’ time and reduce the amount of non-productive busywork that has historically consumed much of the review process. The agency-wide deployment of these capabilities holds tremendous promise in accelerating the review time for new therapies.

5. CRISPieR Bacon

Genetically modified pigs may soon be on their way to your kitchen table, with the FDA approving a breed of hogs resistant to a deadly PRRS virus. The approval could mark progress not only for breakfast plates and pig farmers, but for avoiding the next pandemic:

Stopping viruses is a much better use of CRISPR. And research is ongoing to make pigs—as well as other livestock—invulnerable to other infections, including African swine fever and influenza. While PRRS doesn’t infect humans, pig and bird flus can. But if herds and flocks could be changed to resist those infections, that could cut the chances of the type of spillover that can occasionally cause dangerous pandemics.