Healthcare Industry Actions to Protect Patients During the COVID-19 Pandemic – August 10, 2020

The Healthcare Leadership Council is comprised of leading companies from every sector of American healthcare.  During the COVID-19 pandemic, we will be sharing examples of actions these companies are taking to protect and assist the public and combat the virus’s spread.  If you would like assistance in reaching a representative for any of these companies, please contact Kelly Fernandez at kfernandez@hlc.org. 

• Amgen is engaged in a consortium of pharmaceutical manufacturers called the COVID R&D Alliance. The companies are engaged in a trial involving three different drugs, including Amgen’s Otezla, to determine whether they can combat the life-threatening immune system overreactions afflicting some coronavirus patients.  The trial involves severely ill patients requiring high-flow oxygen.

• With the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warning Americans about the fall and winter months in which the flu and COVID-19 will both affect the population, HMS is hosting a webinar on August 19, “The Flu-COVID Collision: Best Practices to Keep Your Population Healthy This Fall.” Among other topics, the webinar will discuss how to reach vulnerable and high-risk populations with critical health messages.

• Johnson & Johnson has reached an agreement with the federal government to produce 100 million doses of the coronavirus vaccine it is development with the option to develop and deliver 200 million more. When distributed in a COVID-19 vaccination campaign, the drugs will be provided to Americans at no cost.

• The Mayo Clinic’s research project on plasma therapy as a weapon against COVID-19 is yielding promising results. Mayo reported a 10 percentage point difference in deaths between those who received donor plasma with high concentrations of virus-fighting antibodies versus those who received lower concentrations. The study also showed that fewer deaths occur when plasma therapy begins within three or fewer days of a patient’s positive coronavirus diagnosis.

• Premier executives have published an article in the Harvard Business Review discussing their development of an application that integrates with existing electronic health records and can provide real-time surveillance of COVID-19 cases, enabling early warning capability, surge forecasting, and coordinated responses. The application is being utilized in several major health systems.

• A major California health system, Sutter Health, is utilizing clinical direct messaging technologies developed by Surescripts to immediately delivery healthcare data to public health authorities. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the Surescripts tool enables healthcare providers to replace the burdensome and inefficient process of manually reporting data with an automated system.