After reviewing new intelligence, the U.S. Energy Department has concluded that a lab leak in China likely caused the pandemic. But officials told The New York Times the agency had "low confidence" about its conclusion.

Plus, Shionogi believes its antiviral pill could become a blockbuster after a potential approval in the U.S.

Please read below for the latest updates. COVID-19 tracker entries from Sep. 1 to Dec. 31 can be found here.

UPDATED: Monday, Feb. 27 at 8:30 a.m. ET

After reviewing new intelligence, the U.S. Energy Department has concluded that the pandemic was likely caused by a lab leak, The New York Times reports. But officials told the newspaper that the finding was reached with "low confidence." Other government agencies did not change their own conclusions about the pandemic after reviewing the undisclosed new intelligence, NYT notes.

Shionogi believes its COVID-19 antiviral pill could pull in at least $2 billion in annual sales if it's able to secure a U.S. approval, Reuters reports. The company hopes to get an FDA nod late next year. The drug, Xocova, has won an approval in Japan and is competing against antivirals from Pfizer and Merck in Shionogi's home country.

UPDATED: Thursday, Feb. 23 at 8:50 a.m. ET

Pfizer is in a position to continue growing Comirnaty sales despite recent worries about declining demand, analytics firm GlobalData says. The firm projects Comirnaty sales will grow 16% this year thanks to new booster approvals in "key geographies." Beyond 2023, the analysts say the U.S. commercial market will fuel growth in 2024 and beyond.

In a survey conducted by LogiPharma, a conference for supply chains in the life science industry, eight of 10 biopharma companies said COVID-19 research projects have affected their larger pipeline efforts. The pandemic was a "resilience test for the continuity of clinical trials for our entire portfolio," Merck global head of customer integration David Ruiz said in a statement. 

CDMO GenScript ProBio has agreed to produce plasmid DNA for RVAC Medicines as the latter company pursues development of an mRNA COVID-19 vaccine candidate. The manufacturing deal includes potential collaborations on future pipeline projects.

UPDATED: Tuesday, Feb. 21 at 2:00 p.m. ET

High-risk patients in the U.K. will have access to Pfizer's Paxlovid, GSK's Xevudy and Roche's RoActemra under new guidance published by England's National Institute for Health and Care Excellence. The drugs are recommended for different groups of patients depending on their exact situation, but NICE found each option cost-effective in the right circumstances.

Merck's Lagevrio has been a big moneymaker for the New Jersey drug giant, but it has struggled at times in clinical testing. Now, in a phase 3 study, the drug failed to meet the statistical significance bar in cutting the risk of contracting COVID-19 for people who had been exposed to the virus through a household contact. Story

In a phase 3 trial, Shionogi's Xocova met its primary and key secondary endpoints in patients with mild or moderate COVID-19 in Japan, South Korea and Vietnam. Compared with placebo, the drug reduced the time to resolution of five COVID-19 symptoms. It also cut the time to achieve a negative infectious viral titer, Shionogi said. The drug is approved in Japan but remains investigational elsewhere.

Gilead Sciences' Veklury has been found to cut the risk of death in hospitalized patients with COVID-19 "across all variant time periods" in a large real-world study. The drug was associated with a statistically significant reduction in mortality risk in an overall patient population, including those who are immunocompromised, Gilead said. For this study, the team looked at data from more than 500,000 hospitalized adults.

UPDATED: Wednesday, Feb. 15 at 3:05 p.m. ET

It's the feds, not Moderna, that ought to be on the hook for any infringement of Arbutus Biopharma and Genevant Sciences’ patents that took place under government contract to produce COVID-19 shots, the Department of Justice said in a Delaware court filing. Moderna made the same claim last year when it failed to secure an early dismissal of the lawsuit, Reuters points out. Arbutus and Genevant sued Moderna in 2022, seeking royalties on the biotech’s megablockbuster COVID shot Spikevax.

Speaking of COVID shots, the European Medicines Agency plans to make the inoculations an annual affair, similar to the flu vaccine, the regulator said Wednesday. COVID-19 isn’t yet behaving like a seasonal virus such as influenza, though “this might be the direction it will be going,” said Marco Cavaleri, EMA’s head of health threats and vaccine strategies, as quoted by Reuters.

With COVID-19 cases on the decline and vaccines readily available, the World Health Organization is powering down the Independent Allocation of Vaccines Group (IAVG), The Economic Times reports. IAVG was previously established to validate and assess vaccine allocations through the Covax facility. IAVG could be resurrected if the need arises in the future. 

UPDATED: Tuesday, Feb. 14 at 9:51 a.m. ET

In its Vir Biotechnology partnership, GSK is cutting future research on COVID-19 vaccines and antibodies. The company is sticking with its partner on flu and other respiratory disease research, and it's still supporting the rollout of Xevudy where it's already available. Story

The FDA announced the recall of more than 56,000 rapid antigen tests from Universal Meditech. The company distributed the products "without appropriate premarket clearance or approval which potentially could result in inaccurate test results due to lack of performance evaluation by the FDA," the agency said.

As part of its effort to dig into the European Commission's vaccine deal with Pfizer, The New York Times is suing officials for keeping their text messages secret, Euractiv.com reports. The European Commission was expected to comment on the case Tuesday, according to the report.

After 12 years of leadership under Dr. Seth Barkley, Gavi, The Vaccine Alliance, announced that Dr. Muhammad Ali Pate will become the organization's next CEO. Gavi has been instrumental in getting COVID-19 vaccines to people in low- and middle-income countries around the world.

UPDATED: Monday, Feb. 13 at 10:41 a.m. ET

Novavax and the U.S. government agreed to a COVID-19 vaccine contract modification. Under the amended deal, the U.S. will buy up to 1.5 million more doses of the company's shot. In addition, the deal supports development of an updated vaccine, the Maryland-based biotech said.

In Japan, officials canceled an order of nearly 142 million Novavax COVID-19 vaccines, Takeda revealed in a SEC filing (PDF). It's the latest setback for vaccine manufacturers amid a global slowdown in demand for the shots. Takeda and Novavax partnered on the vaccine for the Japanese market back in 2020.

Meanwhile, after The New York Times reported that Johnson & Johnson sought payment for undelivered vaccines, some investors are pushing back. In a letter to CEO Joaquin Duato, the faith-based investor group ICCR said the allegation "verges on extortion."

On the therapeutic front, Pfizer recently launched a branded ad for its antiviral Paxlovid. The drug is still marketed under an emergency use authorization and a full FDA approval is pending. Story

UPDATED: Friday, Feb. 10 at 10:40 a.m. ET

Health officials in New York State will allow mask mandates in hospitals and other healthcare facilities to end on Sunday, multiple news outlets have reported. The pivot follows a steady decline in local transmission rates over the past two months, NY health department data show. That isn’t to say masking will be eradicated altogether, as individual policies will still be left up to each healthcare facility. In New York City, Mayor Eric Adams recently said the city would lift its vaccine mandate for workers because 96% of the city’s workforce had received their primary COVID-19 vaccination series.

The U.S. House of Representatives has voted to end a requirement that most foreign air travelers be vaccinated against COVID, Reuters reports. The policy rollback comes after the Biden Administration in June dropped the stipulation that people arriving in the U.S. by plane need to test negative for COVID, though CDC vaccination requirements for most foreign travelers remain in place. The White House said it was opposed to the bill on Tuesday, and it remains unclear if the Senate will take it up, Reuters notes.  

In another sign of the times, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has added COVID-19 shots to its schedules of routinely recommended vaccines for kids and adults. According to CDC data, nearly 80% of adults in the U.S. have completed their primary COVID-19 vaccination series. By comparison, just 19.2% of people ages 18 and up have received an updated bivalent booster dose.

And while the Biden Administration is set to declare an official end to the COVID-19 public health emergency this May, that doesn’t necessarily portend immediate changes in the U.S. landscape of coronavirus tests, treatments and vaccines, Fierce Medtech reports. In short, even though the public health emergency is set to end, the authority granted by emergency use authorizations (EUA) generally continues until it is terminated by the Department of Health and Human Services secretary, and with public notice in advance. Story

UPDATED: Wednesday, Feb. 8 at 9:00 a.m. ET

Starting Friday, New York City municipal employees will no longer be required to be vaccinated against COVID-19, NPR reports. The change comes about 18 months after the city implemented the vaccine requirement. In a statement, mayor Eric Adams said more than 96% of city employees are already vaccinated.

In California, education officials are abandoning a plan to require COVID-19 vaccines for schoolchildren, San Francisco-based KQED reports. The state's emergency declaration ends later this month.

Tuesday night during his State of the Union speech, President Joe Biden said the U.S. has "broken COVID’s grip on us." COVID-19 deaths are down more than 90%, the president said, and the government will soon end its emergency declaration. But he remembered the more than 1 million U.S. lives lost to the pandemic.

While many big pharma companies saw stock price gains in 2022, the opposite was true for pandemic stars Pfizer, Moderna and Roche. After major gains in 2021, their share prices corrected in 2022. Moderna's share price fell 33% in 2022, while Roche's dropped 32% and Pfizer's slipped 13%. Story

UPDATED: Monday, Feb. 6 at 1:35 p.m. ET

FDA Commissioner Robert Califf and CDC director Rochelle Walensky are among the administration officials who are set to testify Wednesday before Congress on the government response to COVID-19. Vaccine safety is expected to be primary topic. Republican leaders who pushed for the hearings said in statement that government health agencies have “lost the American public’s trust due to misguided mandates and lockdowns.”

Companies that manufacture products to combat the coronavirus pandemic are facing a “steep COVID cliff” in 2023 with sales declining markedly, according to a report in Reuters. Analysts point to investor pressure on companies such as Pfizer, Moderna, Merck and Eli Lilly to turn their COVID profits into M&A and R&D gains.

UPDATED: Thursday, Feb. 2 at 10:17 a.m. ET

A preprint study from researchers on both sides of the Atlantic has linked Merck's antiviral pill Lagevrio with new coronavirus mutations, Bloomberg reports. So far, the novel mutations the team tracked are not more lethal or infectious than existing variants. A Merck spokesperson is quoted in the Bloomberg article as saying there is "no evidence to indicate that any antiviral agent has contributed to the emergence of circulating variants."

As the COVID-19 response continually shifts in the U.S., regulators are making it easier to get antiviral pills from Pfizer and Merck. The FDA has removed the requirement that patients test positive for COVID-19 in order to qualify for the drugs, Reuters reports.

With demand for vaccines slipping, officials at the global vaccine group Gavi have sought to renegotiate supply deals, The New York Times reports. But companies such as Moderna and Novavax are refusing to cancel supply deals or give refunds for pre-paid doses, according to the newspaper.

UPDATED: Tuesday, Jan. 31 at 8:51 a.m. ET

The Biden administration plans to end the COVID-19 public health emergency on May 11. The plan came in response to two bills in the House of Representatives that sought to end the emergency declaration sooner, Fierce Healthcare reports. The Trump administration enacted the public health emergency in early 2020 and it has been extended several times since. With the change, patients, hospital officials and others will need to brace for changes to the ways treatments and tests are paid for, Kaiser Health News reports.

Pfizer has been riding a wave of sales from pandemic countermeasures, but that momentum looks set to end in 2023. The company projects a 64% decline for COVID-19 vaccine Comirnaty this year and a 58% decline for antiviral Paxlovid. As for last year, Comirnaty pulled down $37.8 billion and Paxlovid generated $18.9 billion.

UPDATED: Monday, Jan. 30 at 9:57 a.m. ET

China’s relaxation of its strict zero-COVID policy could portend a sales boost for Pfizer’s antiviral Paxlovid there, Reuters reports. Originally a small market for Paxlovid, Pfizer chief Albert Bourla has said that since the policy was lifted, Pfizer has distributed millions of courses of the company’s treatment in China through a deal with Meheco. That said, the status of deliveries later in 2023 remains murky, Reuters points out. The news outlet reports that talks between Pfizer and China's government health insurer have stymied over price, while Paxlovid is only covered by China's broad healthcare insurance plan until late March.

Plus, China is building out its own home-grown armamentarium of COVID medicines, Reuters points out. The country on Sunday approved two domestically developed therapeutics for adult patients suffering from mild to moderate COVID-19. The drugs were developed by Simcere Pharmaceutical and a unit of Junshi Biosciences, Reuters notes.

Meanwhile, Pfizer is attempting to “set the record straight” after allegations of gain of function and directed evolution research at the company. First, Pfizer stresses it “has not conducted gain of function or directed evolution research,” the company said in a statement issued Friday. Further, to track Paxlovid’s activity against coronavirus mutations, Pfizer on occasion engineers virus to assess the activity of its antiviral, but notes that “these studies are required by U.S. and global regulators for all antiviral products and are carried out by many companies and academic institutions in the U.S. and around the world.”

The pharma industry’s pandemic reputation glow-up seems to have dimmed, according to a new report out by Caliber, which found that in 2022 only four out of 10 people were likely to say something positive about a pharma company. Haleon, which recently spun out from GSK’s consumer unit, ranked as the most respected brand in the survey. On the other end of the spectrum, Novartis, Johnson & Johnson, Moderna, Pfizer and AstraZeneca are among the worst-perceived companies in the sector, with all but Novartis vaccine makers for COVID. Story

UPDATED: Friday, Jan. 27 at 10:55 a.m. ET

Europe is engaged in discussions with Pfizer and BioNTech surrounding the possibility of reducing the 500 million COVID-19 vaccine doses the bloc has committed to buying this year in exchange for paying a higher price, a source with knowledge of the talks told Reuters. Also being discussed is the possibility of extending the delivery deadline to the second half of 2024, according to the source.

An FDA advisory committee voted unanimously to recommend that all vaccines going forward should be bivalent. That would mean that the primary series and boosters would be interchangeable. The committee also considered an annual COVID vaccination schedule, similar to flu vaccines. Story

UPDATED: Thursday, Jan. 26 at 9:29 a.m. ET

A polymerase chain reaction test—which can detect the rapidly spreading XBB.1.5 omicron variant—has been launched by Roche, the company said. The test will help researchers track the progress and lineage of the variant.

Bharat Biotech’s nasal COVID-19 vaccine, BBV154, which was approved for emergency use in India in November, has been launched in the country. The vaccine has been sanctioned for booster use in adults. Bharat has priced the vaccine at 325 rupees ($4) for the government and 800 rupees ($9.81) for private markets.

A report from Australia—citing the experience of two subjects—suggests that taking a non-mRNA COVID-19 vaccine to avoid myocarditis after experiencing it with mRNA vaccines from Pfizer or Moderna is not a good strategy. In the two cases, recipients had additional heart problems after taking Novavax’s conventional COVID vaccine.

Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Peter Welch (D-Vt.) have sent a letter to Moderna CEO Stéphane Bancel questioning the company about its pricing strategy for its COVID-19 vaccine. The company has said it would price its adapted version of Spikevax at between $110 and $130 per dose when the United States goes to a commercial model this year. Warren and Welch are piggy-backing on a similar appeal to Moderna, earlier this month by Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), which the White House also supported. Warren and Welch sent a similar letter last month to Pfizer, which also has said it would price its COVID vaccine at up to $130. Story

UPDATED: Tuesday, Jan. 24 at 1:50 p.m. ET

Over the past few months, anti-vaxxers have rallied behind the hashtag #DiedSuddenly, linking any deaths or even grave injuries—including the sudden collapse of the Buffalo Bills player Damar Hamlin—to COVID vaccination, The Atlantic reports. The movement is fueled by a conspiracy theory video bearing the same moniker. Twitter had originally flagged the documentary as misinformation but later removed the label in November when the social media platform stopped enforcing rules about COVID misinformation.

Axcella said it has gained clarity on a regulatory path for its long COVID drug candidate, AXA1125. The company has filed a phase 2b/3 trial application with the FDA, while suggesting it's also aligned with the U.K.'s Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency on a registrational trial. The drug previously posted mixed results in a phase 2a study, having failed on the primary endpoint but showed improvement on fatigue scores.

An analysis of compensation claims in the state of New York found long COVID could have a significant impact on a person's ability to work. About 71% of people classified by the New York State Insurance Fund as having long COVID either required further medical treatment or were unable to work for at least six months, The New York Times reports. Eighteen percent of long COVID patients had yet to return to work after one year, the report found.

The U.K. government wouldn't disclose financial details of its massive mRNA collaboration with Moderna, The deal, worth 1 billion pound, is aimed at building Britain's mRNA capabilities, including R&D and vaccine manufacturing. But how that money will be spent is less clear.

UPDATED: Monday, Jan. 23 at 11:21 a.m. ET

After years of speculation about the future of the COVID market, the FDA is making its preference clear. The agency will propose an annual dose of updated vaccines to a panel of external advisors, according to briefing documents submitted by the FDA. It asked the panel to consider two shots a year for young children, older adults and those with compromised immunity. The FDA expects that simplifying annual immunization schedules can contribute to simplified vaccine development, fewer administration errors and “less complex” communications, Reuters reports.

The threat of a “tripledemic” of flu, COVID and RSV hasn't fully panned out. Early waves of RSV and the flu peaked before New Year’s, new data from the CDC show. Plus, the seven-day national average of hospital patients testing positive for COVID has declined to 39,000 as of Friday, a surprise as the virus usually spreads faster in the winter. COVID patients are now occupying 5% of hospital beds, compared with 21% this time last year, the Washington Post reports.

Bharat Biotech will launch its intranasal COVID vaccine on January 26. The vaccine, the first of its kind to be made in India, is already approved by the country’s regulatory agency as a heterologous booster dose, meaning it can be used as a booster after any other COVID vaccine.

UPDATED: Friday, Jan. 20 at 10:20 a.m. ET

Moderna’s CEO Stephane Bancel is envisioning a world where the company’s mRNA vaccines can be made on every continent. "We're talking to a couple more countries because I would really like on every continent to have MRNA capacity," he said on a panel at the World Economic Forum annual meeting in Davos, Switzerland, as quoted by BW Business World. The company is building or plotting mRNA factories in Canada, Australia, Britain and Kenya, Bancel pointed out.

Speaking of mRNA COVID vaccines, Sinopharm just nabbed approval to run studies of its mRNA shot targeting Omicron in China, Reuters reports. Sinopharm recently became the China distributor for Merck & Co.’s antiviral molnupiravir, which launched in the country last week.

Elsewhere in China, Fosun Pharmaceutical and Genuine Biotech said they plan to team up with multiple companies to boost production of their oral COVID antiviral azvudine. Azvudine became China’s first homegrown oral antiviral after its approval there last summer. Since then, the companies have said demand for the therapeutic has surged following the dismantling of the government’s zero-COVID restrictions.

UPDATED: Thursday, Jan. 19 at 9:35 a.m. ET

After the CDC disclosed a probe into "very unlikely" stroke risks for Pfizer's updated COVID-19 booster, officials in Europe and Israel found no link, Reuters reports. Earlier this week, the CDC said one of its safety systems flagged a potential stroke risk in people 65 and older, but that subsequent investigations failed to confirm the signal. Story

Speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, Novartis CEO Vas Narasimhan said he expects the COVID-19 pandemic to shift into an "endemic environment" with "sporadic outbreaks." Right now, it's crucial to "turn our attention to pandemic preparedness for the future," Narasimhan added, as quoted by CNBC.

Early data from Johns Hopkins University shows that COVID-19 killed fewer people in the U.S. in 2022 than prior years, CNN reports. The illness claimed the lives of 267,000 people in the U.S. last year compared with 350,000 in 2020 and 475,000 in 2021, according to the preliminary data.

UPDATED: Tuesday, Jan. 17 at 11:00 a.m. ET

Manufacturers of COVID-19 vaccines pressured Twitter to silence activists who were pushing for release of intellectual property and patents which could lead to development of a generic shot, according to a report in The Intercept. The report included an email sent by a BioNTech spokesperson to Twitter requesting it to monitor and suppress related traffic.

Contracting COVID during pregnancy increases the risk of death by seven fold, according to a report in BMJ Global Health. Pooled data spanning 13,000 pregnant women in 12 countries, including the U.S. also showed that infants born to those who are infected were twice as likely to need treatment in the intensive care unit. 

The effects of long COVID have been “massively exaggerated” as a scare tactic, argues Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine professor Marty Makari in an opinion piece in CuencaHighLife, a news source for English-speaking expats in Ecuador. Makari presents evidence from studies that show the threat has been inflated in the U.S. to support the pharma industry.

Pfizer and BioNTech’s updated COVID-19 booster has been flagged by a safety monitoring system to a particular type of brain stroke in the elderly, the CDC says. A possible risk of brain ischemia—caused by blockages in arteries that carry blood to the brain—has not been identified by studies or other databases, said the companies and the CDC, which added that more investigation is needed.

UPDATED: Friday, Jan. 13 at 11:30 a.m. ET

Daiichi Sankyo of Japan has requested in its home country approval of its mRNA vaccine as a booster. A 5,000-person trial of the candidate, DS-5670, showed it produced an antibody response that was at least as strong as that from mRNA shots by Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech.

Amid a wave of COVID infections, frustration is rising in China over the difficulty in accessing oral antivirals Paxlovid (Pfizer) and Lagevrio (Merck). Both companies have balked at the country’s efforts to secure the treatments at a reduced price. Meanwhile—amid shortages and high prices of the drugs—unauthorized versions of the drugs are circulating. Also on Thursday, the World Health Organization claimed that China is underreporting COVID deaths.

AstraZeneca has signed a deal with Genertec Meheco to import and distribute COVID-19 therapy Evusheld in China. The deal is pending approval of the antibody treatment in the country. Evusheld has been shown to be effective against pre and post exposure to the virus. But it also has since been found to be ineffective against some variants.

Johnson & Johnson is winding down production of its disappointing COVID-19 vaccine, said the Wall Street Journal, which chronicles the dissolved partnerships it forged to produce the shot—including one with Merck which is in arbitration. Story

The Biden administration has joined the growing chorus against Moderna’s pricing of its COVID-19 booster as White House press secretary Karin Jean-Pierre said during a briefing that it was “hard to justify.” Moderna CEO Stephane Bancel told the Wall Street Journal on Monday that it would charge between $110 and $130 for its booster when the U.S. goes this year to a commercial model for COVID shots. That prompted Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) to send a letter to the company calling the price hike “unacceptable corporate greed.” Pfizer has proposed the same price range for its COVID shot.

UPDATED: Wednesday, Jan. 11 at 11:20 a.m. ET

In a letter to Moderna, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) has accused the company of “unacceptable corporate greed,” in its plan to jack the price of its COVID-19 vaccine up four fold. Sanders implored the company to consider the government’s role in facilitating Moderna’s rapid development of the vaccine and its newfound status as a commercial powerhouse. Moderna has said it plans to charge up to $130 per shot when the U.S. goes to a commercial model for COVID vaccines.

Moderna also has drawn the ire of FDA advisors who say the company didn’t present preliminary data on its COVID-19 booster that suggest the reconfigured shot may not be any more effective than the company’s original version. “I was angry to find out that there was data that was relevant to our decision that we didn’t get to see," Dr. Paul Offit, a member of the FDA's Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee, told CNN.

Merck and Pfizer are resisting efforts by China to secure their oral antiviral COVID treatments at reduced prices. A local news outlet reported that Merck is selling Lagevrio for $221 for a course of treatment, which is less than the company charges in many other western countries. Talks between Pfizer and China have also stalled. Meanwhile, the launch of Lagevrio in China is set for Friday, another local news outlet reported.

In a related story in China, Merck said it will take legal action against some pharma companies in the country that are providing unauthorized COVID treatments to some jurisdictions and claiming they’ve been authorized by Merck.  

UPDATED: Monday. Jan. 9 at 2:23 p.m. ET

Moderna, similar to rival Pfizer, is eying a higher commercial price in the U.S. for its mRNA vaccine, CEO Stéphane Bancel told The Wall Street Journal at the J.P. Morgan Healthcare Conference. The drugmaker is reportedly eying a price of $110 to $130 per dose, which would be several times higher than the price the government paid for public contracts. So far, vaccines have been provided for free under government supply deals.

Pfizer's antiviral Paxlovid recently launched in China but the drug has failed to pick up national reimbursement there, The Associated Press reports. Officials in China rejected the drug for a nationwide reimbursement program over cost concerns, according to AP.

UPDATED: Thursday, Jan. 5 at 4:04 p.m. ET

Over the month of December, the percentage of new COVID-19 infections in the U.S. caused by new Omicron subvariant XBB.1.5 rose from about 4% to 41%, leading healthcare experts to advise that the public stay informed but not alarmed, CNN reports. The subvariant has spread to at least 29 countries and is “the most transmissible form of Omicron to date,” said Maria Van Kerkhove, an epidemiologist who is the World Health Organization's technical lead on COVID-19.

Japanese drugmaker Shionogi & Co. submitted data to Chinese regulators for its COVID-19 pill, which it expects to be authorized for use as early as this quarter, Chief Executive Officer Isao Teshirogi told Bloomberg. If approved, China would have its third foreign antiviral to treat COVID. The drug has already been approved in Japan to treat patients 12 years and older and requires fewer pills than Pfizer's Paxlovid and Merck's Lagevrio.

The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) issued an extension of the United States' COVID-19 vaccine mandate for foreign travelers. President Joe Biden issued the original mandate in October of 2021 and it will now go through at least April 10, 2023, thanks to health officials warnings of a winter surge, Fox Business reports.

UPDATED: Wednesday, Jan. 4 at 1:31 p.m. ET  

The pandemic "darling" Pfizer is entering a "show me" phase, Bank of America analyst Geoff Meacham said in a note Wednesday. The analyst projects dwindling COVID-19 product sales from the pharma giant in 2023 and 2024, according to a report from Investor's Business Daily.

Speaking of Pfizer, the company's popular antiviral Paxlovid is available in China. More than a dozen community-level medical centers in Shanghai now have the treatment available, China Daily reports.

After China relaxed COVID-19 mitigation measures, the virus is wreaking havoc there. In Shanghai, up to 70% of the population is infected, according to a medical official.

UPDATED: Tuesday, Jan. 3 at 10:40 a.m. ET

Seven former AstraZeneca employees who were fired for refusing to be vaccinated against COVID-19 have filed a lawsuit in Delaware against the company claiming age discrimination. All of the plaintiffs are over age 40 and had filed for religious exemptions to the company’s vaccination policy. Citing a 2021 presentation by the company that said its average age of 48, the complaint alleged that AZ “devised a strategy to eliminate older employees.”

As China pulls away from its zero-COVID approach to taming the virus, it is adopting more remedies from the West. Last week, the country authorized the import of Merck’s COVID treatment Lagevrio (molnupiravir) for those who have been infected and are at risk to progress to a more severe form of the virus. Three weeks ago, China finalized a deal with state-owned China Meheco to import and distribute its COVID treatment Paxlovid.

Merck’s Lagevrio does not reduce the risk of hospitalization or death from COVID-19 among high-risk patients, according to a study conducted at the University of Oxford. The antiviral pill, however, provided faster recovery time and reduced viral detection and load, the study found.

Everest Medicines plans to file for authorization of its mRNA bivalent COVID-19 booster this year in China. The company also will launch trials of the shot in the country. The news came with the company’s reveal of its overall strategic plan for the next two years. In September of 2021, Everest and its mRNA partner Providence Therapeutics of Canada revealed a deal to manufacture and distribute vaccines in China.