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Of 104 reports of supply chain issues with dozens of drugs, meaningful shortages were 40% less likely to occur in Canada than in the U.S., a new study found, and the difference was largely attributed to the approach taken by the Canadian government to the problem. (Silverman, 10/31)

The Biden administration this week is hosting a first-of-its-kind international summit about the use of artificial intelligence in the life sciences as governments and private industry increasingly push the boundaries of biotechnology. The convergence of the life sciences and advanced AI could reveal the underpinnings of diseases, help identify new cures or produce more resistant crops. But there are barriers and bottlenecks — and potential risks — to combining the technologies. (Snyder, 10/31)

The Federal Trade Commission has appealed a federal court ruling blocking its ban on most noncompete agreements. The FTC filed a notice to appeal on Oct. 18, taking the case to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit. Attorneys ultimately expect the Supreme Court to review the issue as several other similar lawsuits over the ban wind their way through the courts. (Kacik, 10/31)

U.S. drugmakers and biotechs have come to rely on Chinese partners for manufacturing, research and ingredients. Now, some of them are looking for alternatives as geopolitical tensions rise. From big pharmaceutical companies such as AstraZeneca to small biotechnology firms like Amicus Therapeutics of New Jersey, which is looking for a non-Chinese company to supply raw materials for its rare-disease treatment, the companies say it is time to reduce China risk. (Hopkins and Leong, 11/1)

Two generic drugmakers, Apotex and Heritage Pharmaceuticals, have agreed to pay a combined $49 million to settle allegations they fixed prices on numerous medicines, the first such agreements since state attorneys general began probing price-fixing in the generics industry a decade ago. (Silverman, 10/31)

Some people who took a new schizophrenia drug for a year improved with only a few side effects, but many dropped out of the research, the company announced Thursday. The results underscore the difficulties in treating schizophrenia, a severe mental illness that can cause people to hear voices, feel paranoid and withdraw from others. High dropout rates are typical in schizophrenia drug studies. (Johnson, 10/31)

Barely 12 years after the publication of the first papers unveiling CRISPR-Cas9, a powerful enzyme for editing DNA, sickle cell patients are now receiving the first approved CRISPR-based medicine, Casgevy. Hundreds of patients with other inherited diseases, cancers, and chronic bacterial and viral infections are enrolled in clinical trials testing other CRISPR treatments. And tens of thousands of papers have been published detailing discoveries of new CRISPR enzymes, new ways to deliver them, and a mountain of preclinical data. (Molteni, 10/31)

When the murder of George Floyd in 2020 ignited calls for racial equity across the U.S., the field of medicine confronted its own thorny questions about race. James Diao, then a medical student at Harvard Medical School, was among the many people who zeroed in on one particular issue: If race is a social construct, why was it a factor in clinical tools used to determine a patient’s risk of disease? (Palmer, 10/31)

Abbott Laboratories and a unit of Reckitt Benckiser Group Plc were cleared by a jury over claims they hid risks their premature-infant formulas can cause a bowel disease that severely sickened a baby boy. It was the companies’ first trial win in litigation over the products. Jurors in state court in St. Louis reached the verdict Thursday, ending the latest trial of more than 1,000 lawsuits alleging the formulas can cause necrotizing enterocolitis, or NEC, a bowel ailment that has been linked to deaths and brain damage. (Feeley, 11/1)