Biotech & Medtech
Biotech & Medtech news — Tuesday 20 October 2026
22 stories from 4 sources, every one in English. Each links to its publisher.
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FDA Official Believes GenAI-enabled Tools Will Need to Be Assessed Like a Physician
MedCity News
Rick Abramson, a radiologist by training and the director of FDA’s Digital Health Center of Excellence said, “We ended up putting out this idea that maybe these devices are starting to behave a little bit more like me as a physician than a…
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STAT+: He’s slashing quality at nursing homes. This state is letting it happen
STAT News
The red-brick nursing home tucked off a busy road in Taunton used to be a rare jewel in a beleaguered industry, polished to a high sheen. Floors gleamed from daily scrubbing. Residents’ clothes came back fresh and neatly folded. Employees…
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Readily Secures $11M for Compliance Intelligence Platform
MedCity News
The Series A round was led by Define Ventures, with participation from Y Combinator and the California Health Care Foundation Innovation Fund. The post Readily Secures $11M for Compliance Intelligence Platform appeared first on MedCity…
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STAT+: State regulators move to seize licenses from nursing home chain that was focus of Boston Globe investigation
STAT News
Massachusetts regulators on Oct. 13 moved to revoke all of the nursing home licenses held by RegalCare, a New Jersey-based company that went on a buying spree in the state after the pandemic, slashed costs, and gutted the quality of care…
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GSK Immunotherapy Gets Accelerated FDA Approval for Treating Rectal Cancer
MedCity News
The GSK cancer immunotherapy Jemperli is now approved for treating advanced cases of rectal cancer harboring a particular genetic signature. It’s a label expansion for Jemperli, which was initially approved as a treatment for endometrial…
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STAT+: A bipartisan group of lawmakers urges the FDA to close a peptide loophole
STAT News
You’re reading the web edition of D.C. Diagnosis, STAT’s twice-weekly newsletter about the politics and policy of health and medicine. Sign up here to receive it in your inbox on Tuesdays and Thursdays. A Theranos whistleblower watched all…
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STAT+: Roche continues to look to China for new drugs
STAT News
Want to stay on top of the science and politics driving biotech today? Sign up to get our biotech newsletter in your inbox. Good morning. I haven’t yet watched the new Elizabeth Holmes documentary, so I haven’t yet read this review by…
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Rapport’s epilepsy drug finds surprising success in bipolar trial
BioPharma Dive
Despite what some analysts described as low expectations, RAP-219 narrowly hit the main goal of a mid-stage study, results that could help it tap a billion-dollar-plus market opportunity.
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Most new drugs are still too costly at launch, ICER says
BioPharma Dive
A new analysis from the non-profit group found that net launch prices for new medicines spiked significantly between 2022 and 2025, and the majority were well above its cost-effectiveness guidelines.
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Why I wish you didn’t want to see Nathan Fielder’s Elizabeth Holmes documentary
STAT News
This essay contains spoilers for “You Can See Everything,” Nathan Fielder’s new film about Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes. As I watched Elizabeth Holmes tell Nathan Fielder that she has never lied in her entire life, I kept thinking…
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STAT+: OpenEvidence’s JAMA paper leaves open questions
STAT News
Y ou’re reading the web edition of STAT’s Health Tech newsletter, our guide to how technology is transforming the life sciences. Sign up to get it delivered in your inbox every Tuesday and Thursday. Good morning health tech readers! It’s…
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STAT+: Pharmalittle: We’re reading about drug launch prices, an AstraZeneca AI deal, and more
STAT News
Rise and shine, everyone, another busy day is on the way. And it is getting off to a pleasant start here on the Pharmalot campus, where clear blue skies and comfy breezes are greeting us. As for the official mascots, they are happily…
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A Radical Proposal to Preserve Cell and Gene Therapy Innovation
MedCity News
Cell and gene therapies are amazing medical breakthroughs but if we don’t find ways to pay for them, the development pipeline will fail. The post A Radical Proposal to Preserve Cell and Gene Therapy Innovation appeared first on MedCity…
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How voters feel about trans rights and abortion access will soon be put to the test
STAT News
Get your daily dose of health and medicine every weekday with STAT’s free newsletter Morning Rounds. Sign up here . Yesterday, I read about some new research that tickled me — a recent paper that found beehives function as a kind of…
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STAT+: Dana-Farber, Beth Israel to begin construction of new $1.68 billion cancer hospital
STAT News
Officials at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Beth Israel Lahey Health celebrated on Monday the start of work on their new $1.68 billion Boston hospital to treat cancer patients, the only medical center of its kind in New England. The…
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Report: Health System M＆A Activity Remains Steady in Third Quarter
MedCity News
A new report on third quarter M&A activity in the healthcare sector found that this quarter’s hospital and health system transactions remained steady, with 2026 potentially set to be a top year for total annual transactions since…
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Hype vs. reality: What pharma’s hottest R＆D bets have actually proved
BioPharma Dive
New types of bispecifics, antibody-drug conjugates and cell therapies haven’t yet proven themselves in the clinic. Pharmaceutical companies are betting billions anyway.
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STAT+: Launch prices for new medicines dipped slightly last year but remain high, analysis finds
STAT News
Amid ongoing angst over prescription drug prices, a new analysis found the median net price for 202 newly launched medicines, when adjusted for inflation and manufacturer discounts, rose by 35% to $257,000 in 2025 from $190,000 in 2022…
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STAT+: The key health care ballot measures we’re watching in the midterms
STAT News
State ballot measures on contentious health care issues like transgender rights and abortion access will provide a concrete view of how voters across the U.S. regard these matters, two years into the Trump administration. In some ways, the…
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Opinion: Resident physicians may lose some of their most important work hour protections
STAT News
Coming off Interstate-280 in California, I rolled my windows all the way down and blasted a top 40 radio station at 2 a.m. I kept blinking to stop myself from drowsing off. At a red light, a horn jolted me awake. I had briefly dozed off…
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Engineered human Argonaute 2 for targeted C-to-U RNA base editing
Nature Biotechnology
Nature Biotechnology, Published online: 20 October 2026; doi:10.1038/s41587-026-03359-y Human Argonaute is repurposed for RNA editing.
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Genetic code expansion enables plant-directed control of bacterial activity
Nature Biotechnology
Nature Biotechnology, Published online: 20 October 2026; doi:10.1038/s41587-026-03360-5 The noncanonical amino acid O-methyl-L-tyrosine is used as a tool to control microbial protein synthesis across diverse plants.