therapeutics

Through the acquisition, Novartis is also gaining access to a new class of RNA therapeutics, called antibody oligonucleotide conjugate, with a platform that enables delivering RNA therapy to muscle, UBS says.

“The Avidity team has built robust programs with industry leading delivery of RNA therapeutics to muscle tissue,” Novartis CEO Vas Narasimhan said.

“The ability to manipulate these cells so that they can become powerful, specific therapeutics is really the promise of the field,” Bluestone said.

"Most things we do to a virus makes it weaker or not work as well, or maybe you're trying to engineer it for therapeutics, and I'd hate to see somebody throw cold water on that."

Participating manufacturers will have to allocate 20% of their production of vaccines, therapeutics and diagnostics to the WHO.