“We aim to be a start-up company with an academic spirit”

Chronic pain and Alzheimer’s are two diseases that plague many people worldwide and seem impossible to cure. However, Huddinge-based company Alzecure is working on developing drugs for both conditions.

Biosimilars bring price pressure, but are they sufficiently used?

When biosimilars were introduced just over 16 years ago, hopes were raised that they would give many more patients access to effective but otherwise extremely expensive treatments with biological drugs. So, how well has Swedish healthcare used biosimilars? The answer partly depends on whom you ask.

Business Sweden’s new team is rolling out the blue-yellow carpet

According to Business Sweden’s life science team, the combination of substantial medical know-how and an ever-flourishing tech sector is a success factor for Sweden. “It’s a perfect storm, a beneficent, perfect storm,” says Programme Manager Britta Stenson.

Bought a tablet factory – and built his own empire

. However, instead, it actually turned out to be the starting point for one of the biggest success stories in Swedish life science.

Anna Törner: Kalashnikovs in a new guise

Thanks to resisting European regulatory authorities, Europe has been spared the opioid epidemic. In the 1960s, the situation was the opposite as the American pharmaceutical authority, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), refused to approve thalidomide (Neurosedyn), writes Anna Törner in a column.

Lucy Robertshaw: Did you know Stockholm wants to be in top 5 in the world for Life Sciences?

Karolinska Institutet Solna Campus has certainly become the next “Kendall Square”, writes Lucy Robertshaw in a column.

BioVentureHub CEO: “Companies with a high degree of interaction achieve greater success”

he also highlights a study that points out that companies with a high degree of interaction with other companies achieve greater success.

Tablet treatment for hair loss approved in the USA

The US Drug Administration has given a thumbs up for the first tablet treatment for spotty hair loss.

Björn Arvidsson: “We need robust and recognized ecosystems for continued competitiveness”

“We have idea carriers and excellent innovation opportunities, and now we must invest in creating ecosystems that provide them with even better growth opportunities,” Björn Arvidsson writes in a column.

The first vaccine derived from cowpox

The British rural doctor could not forget the words of the peasant girl. Could that really be true? A couple of decades later, on 14 May 1796, he performed the world’s first smallpox vaccination, and a medical breakthrough had occurred.

Anna Törner: To kill your darlings

Hopes were high when Anna Törner and her colleague started a study on a dietary supplement that seemed unbelievably good. “Enthusiastically, we dreamed of exciting results and perhaps a publication in a high-impact journal,” she writes in a column.

Investments worth 40 billion in the Öresund region – “A huge investment wave”

A new report reveals that medical companies in the Oresund region are investing like never before.

New rules for diagnostic products, but who will certify them? “An extreme shortage area”

In less than two weeks, new and stricter EU rules will enter into force for thousands of products used in important diagnoses of, among other things, cancer and Covid-19. However, not one single institute in the entire Nordic region is able to certify the diagnostics companies’ products according to the new regulations. “In the end, it risks affecting patients,” says Anna Lefèvre Skjöldebrand, CEO of Swedish Medtech.

When carelessness, forgetfulness and coincidence become the researcher’s best friend

Forgetfulness, coincidence and a stroke of luck hardly make up a fruitful method of serious research. Or do they? Actually, a number of important medical advances have come about thanks to completely random incidents and the open-mindedness of scientists who were ready to think outside the box.

“Together Stockholm-Uppsala and Medicon Valley can make Scandinavia a leading life science region”

“Denmark, Sweden, Norway and Finland all have national life science strategies, but the Swedish strategy is the only one explicitly emphasizing the Nordic dimension. But what if the leading life science nations, Denmark and Sweden, joined forces, took the lead and pioneered Nordic life science collaboration? Wouldn´t we then be able to "bake a bigger cake?", writes Anette Steenberg and Ulf G. Andersson in a debate article.

The route to vaccines for everyone: “We did not just sit around and wait”

The pandemic was in full swing, and no one knew when or even if a vaccine would come. At that point, the Swedish Minister of Social Affairs called with a proposal, and Richard Bergström did not hesitate. “I already had a notion that this would work,” he says in an interview with Life Science Sweden.

Anna Törner: Success requires bold decisions!

“Doing things right is fine, but doing the right things as soon as possible is even better”, writes Anna Törner in a column.

Tablettbehandling mot covid-19 granskas löpande av EMA

Den europeiska läkemedelsmyndigheten EMA har inlett en löpande granskning av molnupiravir, som vid ett godkännande kan bli det första orala antivirala läkemedlet mot covid-19 i Europa.

Anna Törner: You won’t find this many Concorde projects anywhere else

"Suddenly Concorde projects seem reasonable in life science because it´s about life and death", writes Anna Törner in a column.

MVA:s CEO: “Our investments should improve people´s everyday lives”

Involuntary infertility and diabetes are two of the areas on the agenda of the Medicon Valley Alliance.

Han är ny vd på Brighter

Healthtechbolaget Brighter har utsett Erik Lissner till tillförordnad vd och hoppas att turbulensen kring ledarskapet är över.

Column: Why there cannot be a complete cure for cancer – but there is certainly another way!

"Is there a new way we need to be thinking about how to prevent cancer?" Lucy Robertshaw reflects upon which is the smartest way to beat cancer.

Column: "Are we already living in the new normal?"

2020 felt like the year that we were building the house around us whilst moving into it at the same time.

New diagnostic test soon ready for the market