→ David Hung of­fered a hard sell of his ex­per­i­men­tal PARP drug ta­la­zoparib while bid­ders lined up in what turned out as a $14 bil­lion Medi­va­tion buy­out by Pfiz­er. Now re­searchers are spelling out all the da­ta in an ar­ti­cle in the New Eng­land Jour­nal of Med­i­cine as Pfiz­er lines up a quick re­view and like­ly OK for a drug that will face some well en­trenched com­peti­tors.

→ Salt Lake City-based Tolero Phar­ma­ceu­ti­cals has struck a deal to share the costs on an up­com­ing com­bo can­cer drug tri­al with Ab­b­Vie. Re­searchers will match Tolero’s alvo­cidib, a CDK9 drug, with Ab­b­Vie’s vene­to­clax for treat­ment re­sis­tant cas­es of acute myeloid leukemia.

A plant located in Wrexham, Wales that is packing the Oxford/AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine into vials was surrounded by a bomb squad after officials called police to report a suspicious package.

The alert caused a partial evacuation of the plant, the BBC was among those to report Wednesday. The owner of the plant, British drugmaker Wockhardt UK, said it was cooperating with local authorities and that there were no reports of any injuries.

Hours before President Biden’s Covid-19 team gave their first virtual press conference, the famed AIDS researcher David Ho delivered concerning news in a new pre-print: SARS-CoV-2 B.1.351, the variant that emerged in South Africa, is “markedly more resistant” to antibodies from convalescent plasma and vaccinated individuals.

The news for several monoclonal antibodies, including Eli Lilly’s bamlanivimab, was even worse: Their ability to neutralize was “completely or markedly abolished,” Ho wrote. Lilly’s antibody cocktail, which was just shown to dramatically reduce the risk of hospitalizations or death, also became far less potent.

Psychedelics have made a comeback for mental health research, with companies like startup biotech ATAI Life Sciences raising millions and earning the backing of prominent investors like Peter Thiel, but there’s a hole at the heart of the resurgence: Researchers still don’t fully understand how they work.

A new partnership between ATAI and world-renowned Mass General Hospital hopes to change that.