Top Story

Fitbit could raise as much as $478M in IPO, House panel votes to repeal medical device tax (Morning Read)

Fitbit priced its IPO this week.

TOP STORIES

Fitbit priced its IPO this week at $14-$16 per share, which means it could raise up to $478 million.

The House Ways and Means Committee has voted to repeal the medical device tax.

LIFE SCIENCE

Pfizer, GE team up on cancer research.

The White House will launch the first fight on antibiotic resistance in order to spread awareness about proper use of antibiotics to prevent drug-resistant superbugs.

Are the positive results for Sprout Pharmaceutical’s equivalent of Viagra for women, flibanserin, significantly better than a placebo and do they outweigh safety concerns? An FDA advisory board is expected to present its recommendations this week.

Medical device company Saranas raised $2.35 million to develop a sheath that detects real time blood leaks caused by catheters.

PAYERS-PROVIDERS

Texas telemedicine company Teladoc Inc. won a court order that blocked a new state rule which required doctors to meet patients before carrying out the telemedicine process.

Aspire Health raised $15 million in a Series C round led by Oak HC/FT for its palliative care treatment model.

TECH

Castlight Health Inc. is planning to roll out Castlight Elevate, a service that lets employees research behavioral health services and care through a personalized platform. Castlight Eleveate is the newest extension of Castlight Enterprise Healthcare Cloud.

Cohearo Health gets FDA clearance for its Bluetooth-connected spirometer.

StartUp Health has added 12 more startups to its Academy as it celebrates it fourth anniversary.

Adults use the Internet frequently for health-related queries, but what about teens? About 84 percent of teens have obtained health information online, according to a study from the Center on Media and Human Development at  Northwestern University.

POLITICS

House GOP leaders plan to release a full Obamacare backup plan after the court ruling.

About 10.2 million people signed up for health insurance under the Affordable Care Act and paid their premiums by the end of March. About 13 percent of people who signed up for health insurance coverage this year under the Affordable Care Act fell from the rolls because they didn’t pay their premiums.

The Veterinary Feed Directive final rule is part of the FDA’s initiative to fight antimicrobial medication overuse in people and animals.

A LITTLE EXTRA

A Canadian court has ordered three tobacco companies — Imperial Tobacco Canada, Rothmans Benson & Hedges and JTI-MacDonald — to pay $12 billion the largest award for damages in the country’s history. The companies plan to appeal.

The Morning Read provides a 24-hour wrap up of everything else healthcare’s innovators need to know about the business of medicine (and beyond). The author of The Read published it but all full-time MedCity News journalists contribute to its content.

Photo: Getty

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