Plus: FDA approves non-opioid painkiller |
In this week’s edition of InnovationRx, we look at Elon Musk’s attack on USAID, lawsuits challenging Trump's healthcare executive orders, a new non-opioid painkiller, a key vote for RFK Jr., and more. (Did someone forward you this email? Subscribe here.)
For the past week, billionaire Trump donor Elon Musk and his extra-governmental group called DOGE have been waging war on the U.S. Agency for International Development. Musk (who the White House said Monday was a “special government employee”) has said that the agency, known as USAID, must “die,” and that Trump had “agreed” to shutter it,On Monday, USAID staff were told to stay out of the agency’s Washington, D.C. headquarters, where officers and yellow police tape blocked off the building’s lobby, while hundreds of additional employees reported being locked out of the aid agency’s computer system overnight. By Monday afternoon, with the agency’s website offline, Trump’s secretary of state Marco Rubio confirmed to reporters traveling with him in Central America that he was now acting administrator of USAID. He told reporters that many of the agency’s programs would continue under the State Department, and blamed the change on worker “insubordination.” By Wednesday morning, USAID’s website was gone except for a note that the vast majority of its global workforce would be placed on administrative leave by 11:59pm this Friday. The move triggered outrage among Democratic lawmakers, a group of whom gathered outside USAID’s headquarters on Monday afternoon in protest. “This is a constitutional crisis that we are in today. Let’s call it what it is,” Senator Chris Murphy, D-Conn., said at a press conference there. “The people get to decide how we defend the United States of America. The people get to decide how their taxpayer money is spent. Elon Musk does not get to decide.” In a post on X, Brian Reidl, a senior fellow at the conservative Manhattan Institute, also called what was happening at USAID “absolutely a constitutional crisis.” As he wrote there, “The president has zero legal authority to ‘shut down,’ defund, or otherwise cripple a $50 billion agency. Audit it, identify unnecessary expenditures, draft reform or rescission proposals, and then go to Congress to PASS A LAW.” USAID was set up in the early-1960s by then-President John F. Kennedy to administer humanitarian aid programs on behalf of the United States. It provides food in countries where people are starving, and offers treatments for HIV/AIDS and vaccinations against polio in countries where those diseases are major threats, among numerous other programs.
Despite the Trump Administration saying that “lifesaving” work was exempt from its freeze on foreign aid activities, lifesaving antibiotics and antimalarial drugs were sitting in the Port of Sudan, essential medicines were expiring in Congo, and millions of pounds of soybeans bound for refugee camps had been diverted to warehouses, according to NBC News. Ironically, USAID has also spent as much as $1 million on Starlink terminals from Musk’s company, SpaceX, over the last four years bringing them to Zimbabwe and South Africa; it had previously spent some $3 million on Starlink terminals for Ukraine after the Russian invasion. Foreign aid spending, of which USAID is a piece, is just a tiny speck of the overall federal budget, representing less than 1%, though opinion polls consistently report that Americans falsely think foreign aid represents some 25% of it. Nonprofits, including Catholic Relief Services and Save the Children implement more than half of USAID’s budget. The impact of cutting USAID spending will be felt in the more than 100 countries the agency operates. As Dr. Atul Gawande, the former head of global health at USAID under President Biden, said on Fox News on Monday: “What’s happening right now is dangerous for the United States and humanity. These are people shutting down an agency and having no clue the work that is being done.” |
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| | | Multiple Lawsuits Challenge Executive Orders That Impact Healthcare |
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| The abrupt spending freeze on federal grants that had impacted federally funded research has been lifted–for now. In two lawsuits against the Administration, judges have placed temporary restraining orders, meaning that the pause on spending is lifted. The National Science Foundation confirmed to Forbes that it was resuming grant funding. The National Institutes of Health also resumed some grant reviewing operations, according to Science. However, federal agencies are still disrupting typical operations in an attempt to comply with President Trump’s sweeping order against diversity efforts. Documents obtained by Forbes from the NSF confirm that the use of one of 180 specific terms in a grant application will cause it to be flagged for deeper review by NSF case officers to possibly be pulled and rejected. Among the terms: bias, diversity, equality, gender, historically, prejudice, status and women. The CDC and other health agencies have also hastily pulled healthcare data and resources off of their websites, including on subjects like HIV. A coalition of local governments, nonprofits and universities has filed a lawsuit against Trump’s orders on DEI and gender, reports Inside Higher Ed. The lawsuit argues that Trump exceeded his executive legal authority and that the order violates both the First and Fifth amendments. Researchers impacted by these orders have also told Forbes that federal statutes mandate diversity and inclusion efforts in the grantmaking process, putting Trump at odds with federal law. Separately, a group of physicians sued federal agencies last week over the removal of healthcare data and resources from public websites. Another of Trump’s executive orders called for the federal government to halt funding for gender-affirming medical care through government-run health insurance programs. Lambda Legal and the ACLU, representing families affected, have sued, alleging that the order is unconstitutional because it withholds money authorized by Congress and violates antidiscrimination laws. Meanwhile, thousands protested in New York as NYU Langone called off gender-affirming procedures for trans kids. |
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| The FDA approved a new non-opioid painkiller from Vertex Pharmaceuticals called Journavx. The painkiller for treating moderate to severe pain blocks pain signals before they reach the brain, unlike opioids that reduce pain by latching receptors to the brain and create the risk of addiction. It has a lofty list price of $15.50 per pill. Analysts estimate the medication could produce up to $1 billion in annual sales. Vertex plans to test the new medication’s use for chronic pain next. Also: San Francisco-based startup SiteOne Therapeutics announced positive data from a phase 1 clinical trial of its non-opiod painkiller candidate, known as STC-004. It plans to begin phase 2 clinical trials for peripheral pain in the second half of the year. |
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| PUBLIC HEALTH + HOSPITALS |
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| After a pair of confirmation hearings in which Robert F. Kennedy Jr. dodged questions about past statements suggesting Lyme disease is a bioweapon, raised concerns about his understanding of the basic operations of Medicare and Medicaid and stood by his comments that WiFi causes cancer, the Senate Finance Committee voted along party lines to support his nomination for Secretary of Health and Human Services. One pivotal “yes” came from Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-La., a physician who had previously expressed serious concerns about Kennedy’s past anti-vaccine activism. Cassidy later said on the Senate floor that the Trump administration had promised that the CDC website would keep its page explaining that vaccines don’t cause autism and would not change its vaccine advisory procedures. Left unspoken in the chambers was Cassidy’s 2026 re-election. He already faces a tough primary fight thanks to his vote to impeach Trump in 2021, and could face additional hurdles if he voted no because billionaire Trump donor Elon Musk has said he’d fund primary challengers against any Republican who failed to support the president’s nominees. Kennedy’s nomination will now proceed to a full Senate vote, where he is expected to be confirmed. |
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| Australian-based radiopharmaceuticals startup AdvanCell has raised a $112 million series C round. SV Health Investors, Sanofi Ventures, Abingworth, and SymBiosis were the co-leaders of the round. The capital will be used to advance its lead candidate for prostate cancer, currently in a Phase 1/2 clinical trial, as well as to support development of its pipeline of drug candidates against melanoma, breast, colorectal and other cancers. |
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