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An experimental drug halved the death rate among critically ill Covid patients who were receiving supplemental oxygen and were at high risk for serious lung disease and death, the drug’s developer announced on Monday. ... The new drug, sabizabulin, reduced deaths among hospitalized Covid-19 patients so drastically in a clinical trial that independent safety monitors recommended stopping it early, officials at Veru Inc., the drug’s maker, said. The trial was halted on Friday. The results of that trial have not been peer-reviewed or published in a medical journal. (Rabin, 4/11)

Thousands of doses of COVID-19 therapeutics and preventive treatments sit unused in Michigan because doctors haven't been prescribing them, the state's top doctor told the Free Press last week. "The issue in the beginning had been that we thought demand would outpace supply and that didn't really happen in the state of Michigan or in most of the country," said Dr. Natasha Bagdasarian, the state's chief medical executive. "What we really saw was the clinicians were a little bit hesitant to prescribe it ... because they were still learning about it." (Jordan Shamus, 4/11)

CVS Pharmacy has reached a settlement with federal prosecutors that will ensure the company’s online vaccination scheduling portal remains fully accessible to people with disabilities, officials said Monday. The U.S. attorney’s office in Rhode Island alleged the company, which operates nearly 10,000 retail pharmacies nationwide, was in violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act because the portal was not accessible to people who use screen reader software designed for the visually impaired, and to those who have difficulty using a mouse. (4/11)

How much worse could the US COVID-19 pandemic have been if vaccinations hadn’t arrived in the nick of time in December 2020? Unimaginably worse, according to a study released last week. The researchers estimated that vaccinations by the end of last month had averted more than 2.2 million deaths, more than 17 million hospitalizations, and more than 66 million infections.“ Our findings highlight the profound and ongoing impact of the vaccination program in reducing infections, hospitalizations, and deaths,” said the study released Friday by the Commonwealth Fund, a venerable nonprofit that focuses on improving health care, particularly for society’s most vulnerable. (Finucane, 4/11)

Vaccine makers Pfizer Inc. and Moderna Inc. named company outsiders as chief financial officers as they look to deploy some of the cash they have generated during the Covid-19 pandemic. New York-based Pfizer on Monday said David Denton will take over as CFO on May 2. Mr. Denton has served as finance chief of home-goods retailer Lowe’s Cos. since 2018. Before that, he led the finances of CVS Health Corp. , the Woonsocket, R.I.-based drugstore and health-services chain. (Broughton, 4/11)

David M. Denton was named the next CFO and EVP at Pfizer, effective May 2. Prior to joining Lowe’s in 2018 as CFO, Denton served as CFO and EVP at CVS Health. He helped guide the transformation of CVS from a retail pharmacy to a health solutions provider and led the full integration of Caremark into CVS, according to Pfizer. Denton also negotiated the terms and financing for CVS’s acquisition of Aetna in December 2017. The $70 billion deal closed in November 2018. (Estrada, 4/11 )