The National Comprehensive Cancer Network has published new clinical practice guidelines for evaluation of patients who before hematopoietic cell transplantation. The document also includes a treatment algorithm and addresses identification and management of acute and chronic graft-versus-host disease.

The World Health Organization reported that measles cases around the world rose from 7,585,900 in 2017 to 9,769,400 in 2018, while measles-related deaths increased from 124,000 to 142,300 during the same period, with most deaths involving unvaccinated children. Meanwhile, a CDC study in the agency's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report showed that although yearly global measles incidence and deaths dropped between 2000 and 2018 and vaccination prevented 23.2 million deaths during that period, the number of infections and deaths have increased since 2016.

The World Health Organization reported Thursday that at least 5,000 people have died from a measles epidemic this year in the Democratic Republic of Congo, many of them children. Factors such as high malnutrition levels and low immunization rates have contributed to the spread of the disease.

The global vaccine alliance GAVI will stockpile 500,000 doses of Merck's Ervebo Ebola vaccine for future outbreaks. Lower- and middle-income countries will have free access to the stockpile, but other countries must reimburse the vaccine's cost to GAVI.

Regeneron Pharmaceuticals unveiled topline data from a midstage trial assessing its candidate REGN3918, or pozelimab, as a treatment for paroxysmal nocturnal hemoglobinuria. Results showed that after being treated once a week, patients' lactate dehydrogenase levels returned to normal by the eighth week.

Dynavax Technologies' vaccine HEPLISAV-B will soon become available at 1,700 pharmacies after the pharma firm entered a partnership deal with Albertsons. HEPLISAV-B is approved as a preventive treatment against hepatitis B virus in adults aged 18 and up.

China's National Medical Product Administration approved CASI Pharmaceuticals' application, filed by Juventas Cell Therapy, its partner, to launch the trial for its investigational therapy candidate CNCT19, or CD19 chimeric antigen receptor T-cell therapy, to treat relapsed or refractory B-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia and B-cell non-Hodgkin lymphoma. Enrollment is slated to begin early next year.

The AABB Standards for Molecular Testing for Red Cell, Platelet and Neutrophil Antigens, 5th Edition, will take effect Oct. 1, 2020. The Molecular Testing Standards Committee hopes to engage members in developing the 5th edition and asks interested parties to submit comments to help shape these updates. The Committee will review all responses during its next meeting, to be held in January 2020. AABB will continue to hold the 60-day open comment period following the release of the proposed Standards, currently scheduled to begin in February.