Sustained Efficacy of Long-Acting Cabotegravir for PrEP Among Cisgender Women – Findings from HPTN 084 Study

DURHAM, N.C., July 28, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Researchers from the HIV Prevention Trials Network (HPTN) presented updated results from the HPTN 084 long-acting cabotegravir (CAB) for pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) study at the AIDS 2022 conference in Montreal. New findings show reductions in HIV incidence were sustained in the 12 months following trial unblinding (November 5, 2020, through November 5, 2021).

“These results are encouraging as CAB efficacy was sustained during the 12 months following unblinding, confirming a high level of protection against HIV acquisition among study participants assigned female at birth,” said Dr. Sinead Delany-Moretlwe, HPTN 084 protocol chair, director of research at Wits RHI, and research professor at the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa.

HPTN 084 is an ongoing Phase 3 randomized, controlled trial that previously demonstrated the superiority of ViiV Healthcare’s long-acting cabotegravir compared to daily oral tenofovir/emtricitabine (TDF/FTC) for HIV prevention in individuals assigned female at birth. The blinded portion of the trial was stopped at a planned interim review in November 2020 due to evidence of superior efficacy when compared to daily oral TDF/FTC. Participants were subsequently unblinded and continued their original randomized study regimen pending a protocol amendment to offer open-label CAB.

“HIV infection continues to threaten the health of women worldwide,” said Dr. Myron Cohen, HPTN co-principal investigator, and director of the Institute for Global Health at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill. “Empowering women with safe and effective PrEP options is critical to reducing HIV as a global health threat.”

HPTN 084 enrolled 3,223 cisgender women at research sites in Botswana, Eswatini, Kenya, Malawi, South Africa, Uganda, and Zimbabwe. Twenty-three incident infections (3 CAB, 20 TDF/FTC) were detected in the 12-month unblinded period. Of these, two (1 CAB, 1 TDF/FTC) were determined to have occurred during the blinded phase. Only one of the CAB cases (blinded phase case) had ever received an injection. An additional 83 confirmed pregnancies (43 CAB, 40 TDF/FTC) occurred in the unblinded period. No congenital anomalies were reported.

“The additional pregnancy incidence data highlight the importance of establishing the safety and pharmacology of CAB among pregnant individuals,” said Dr. Wafaa El-Sadr, HPTN co-principal investigator, director of ICAP, and professor of epidemiology and medicine at Columbia University in New York.

HPTN 084 was co-funded by NIAID, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and ViiV Healthcare. Study product was provided by ViiV Healthcare and Gilead Sciences, Inc. Three other NIH institutes also collaborated on HPTN 084: the National Institute of Mental Health, the National Institute on Drug Abuse, and the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development.

About HPTN

The HIV Prevention Trials Network (HPTN) is a worldwide collaborative clinical trials network that brings together investigators, ethicists, community members, and other partners to develop and test the safety and efficacy of interventions designed to prevent the acquisition and transmission of HIV. The U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, the U.S. National Institute of Mental Health, Office of The Director, the U.S. National Institute on Drug Abuse, and the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, all part of the U.S. National Institutes of Health, co-fund the HPTN. The HPTN has collaborated with more than 85 clinical research sites in 19 countries to evaluate new HIV prevention interventions and strategies in populations with a disproportionate HIV burden. The HPTN research agenda – more than 50 trials ongoing or completed with over 161,000 participants enrolled and evaluated – is focused primarily on discovering new HIV prevention tools and evaluating integrated strategies, including biomedical interventions combined with behavioral risk reduction interventions and structural interventions. For more information, visit hptn.org.


Eric Miller
HIV Prevention Trials Network (HPTN)
9193846465
emiller@fhi360.org

Chargebee Enables Subscription Businesses to Combat Economic Turmoil with 2022 Summer Product Release

New Product Launch Leans Heavily on Customer Retention, Monetization and Streamlining Revenue Operations

San Francisco, Calif., July 28, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Chargebee, the leading subscription management platform, today announced its Summer 2022 Product Release. The slate of new products and features is focused on enabling high-performing subscription businesses to monetize their existing customers and fend off the growing threats of a tumultuous economy. These new products help businesses build their cash reserves and maintain their customer base at a time when many businesses – and their customers – are struggling with the realities of inflation and drying up of venture capital, the lingering effects of COVID-19 and a decimated global supply chain.

The centerpiece of Chargebee’s Summer 2022 Product Release is Chargebee Retention, formerly Brightback, which along with Chargebee Receivables (numberz), and RevRec (RevLock), all acquired by Chargebee over the last 18 months, represent Chargebee’s initial foray into becoming a true multi-product company.

Chargebee Retention allows businesses to focus on keeping the customers they already have at a time when both businesses and consumers are being forced to evaluate everything in their portfolios and make difficult decisions. Chargebee Retention enables businesses to customize cancellation experiences with offers geared towards continuing the customer relationship and allows businesses to test out personalized retention-magnet strategies to minimize voluntary churn and strengthen customer lifetime value with an ROI of as much as 800%.

“For subscription businesses, acquiring new customers is at least 2.5 times more expensive than upselling or expanding an existing customer. This factor can be even higher with intelligent automation that decreases customer churn while increasing the chances of expansion,” said Mark Thomason, IDC Research Director responsible for Digital Business Models and Monetization practice. “While these retention capabilities are critical during these tumultuous times, keeping happy customers is always in vogue.”

Chargebee Receivables helps businesses improve their cash flow management processes by automating accounts receivable workflows. Subscription businesses will now be able to efficiently automate their entire accounts receivables workflow and process from purchase to payment. In addition, Chargebee Receivables also lets businesses proactively engage with customers on predicted payment failure to minimize involuntary churn and increase customer retention.

“Customer retention has become an even bigger focus for us over the past year or so,” said Bob Viscount, Vice President at Silhouette U. “The economy has changed a lot, and we’ve been looking for a solution that helps mitigate some of the cancellations we’ve been seeing.  Customers have chosen to cancel due to cost and having an option to deflect some of these cancellations with a tailored offer in the moment has been a huge boost to our business. Chargebee Retention has proven to be a value-add to our business and has allowed us to provide customers with a comprehensive review of what they’d be giving up while also leveraging offers when needed. The results in a very short amount of time have convinced me that this needs to be a critical component to our business moving forward.”

The volatility of today’s market landscape has forced businesses to become adaptable and nimble in ways they hadn’t previously expected, tinkering with package and feature offerings and providing new and different services to customers at different price points.  The new Chargebee Entitlements offers businesses more control over this new path and enables them to upsell to existing customers by showing them value. Chargebee Entitlements enables businesses to “value-test” and experiment with different packaging and pricing options, better control feature launches with roll-outs to small subsets of customers, and go to market faster. Chargebee Entitlements helps go-to-market teams provide feature access to customers beyond their plan on the flip of a switch, which can be used to incentivize plan upgrades and free-to-paid conversions.

“We’ve spent months engaging with our customers, learning the ins and outs of their businesses and working with them to determine what types of tools they want and need to face their current challenges head-on,” said John Pearce, Vice President of Product Management at Chargebee. “In those conversations, the focus almost always homed in on retaining customers, building long-lasting customer relationships and understanding how Chargebee can help businesses monetize their existing customer base. Chargebee Retention, Chargebee Receivables and Chargebee Entitlements are a direct result of our findings and our desire to give our customers exactly what they need to build and scale their businesses, even in these trying times.”

The complete list of features in Chargebee’s Summer 2022 Product Release, which also includes in-app purchase management, multi-entity management, integration with PandaDoc to manage quote-based subscription workflows, a RevRec integration that helps businesses recognize revenue in local currency and avoid challenges that hinder growth, and RevRec’s ASC 606 expense recognition, can be found here: https://www.chargebee.com/summer-release-2022/

About Chargebee

Chargebee is the subscription management platform that automates revenue operations of over 4,500 subscription-based businesses from startups to enterprises. The SaaS platform helps subscription businesses across verticals, including SaaS, eCommerce, e-learning, IoT, Publications, and more, manage and grow revenue by automating subscription billing, invoicing, payments, and revenue recognition operations, provides key metrics, reports, and business insights and now offers Chargebee Retention and Chargebee Receivables. Founded in 2011, Chargebee counts businesses, like Okta, Freshworks, Calendly, and Study.com amongst its global customer base. Learn more about Chargebee at www.chargebee.com.

Jake Katz
Chargebee
jake.katz@chargebee.com

Los Angeles County Avoids New Mask Rule as COVID Stabilizes

Los Angeles County dropped a plan to impose a universal indoor mask mandate this week as COVID-19 infections and rates of hospitalizations have stabilized, a top health official said Thursday.

Health director Barbara Ferrer said two weeks ago that the nation’s most populous county could again require face coverings if trends in hospital admissions continued under criteria set by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

On Thursday, she said the county had dodged imposition of the broad mask rule. The county remains at the “high” CDC level of community transmission, but it could drop to “medium” in coming weeks.

Ferrer made the announcement during a briefing at which she displayed flat and declining data graphs. She said transmission had dropped steadily since July 23, “potentially signaling the beginning of a downward trend in cases.” Hospitalizations are also down.

“We’re on a decline right now, and it’s hard for us to imagine reinstating universal indoor masking when we’re on this significant of a decline,” Ferrer said. But she added that health officials would reassess things should case rates and hospital admissions spike again.

While masks won’t be required in most indoor spaces, Ferrer reminded residents that face coverings remain an effective tool to reduce the spread of the coronavirus.

As it has for most of the pandemic, L.A. County will still require masks in some indoor spaces, including health care facilities, mass transit vehicles, airports, jails and homeless shelters.

The new mandate, which would have gone into effect Friday, would have expanded the requirement to all indoor public spaces, including shared offices, manufacturing facilities, warehouses, retail stores, restaurants and bars, theaters and schools.

Nationwide, the latest COVID-19 surge is driven by the highly transmissible BA.5 variant, which now accounts for a majority of cases. It has shown a remarkable ability to get around the protection offered by vaccination.

Source: Voice of America

Study: Climate Change Made UK Heat Wave Hotter, More Likely

Human-caused climate change made last week’s deadly heat wave in England and Wales at least 10 times more likely and added a few degrees to how brutally hot it got, a study said.

A team of international scientists found that the heat wave that set a new national record high at 40.3 degrees Celsius was made stronger and more likely by the buildup of heat-trapping gases from the burning of coal, oil and natural gas. They said Thursday that temperatures were 2 to 4 degrees Celsius warmer in the heat wave than they would have been without climate change, depending on which method scientists used.

The study has not been published in a peer-reviewed scientific journal yet but follows scientifically accepted techniques, and past such studies have been published months later.

“We would not have seen temperatures above 40 degrees in the U.K. without climate change,” study senior author Friederike Otto, a climate scientist at Imperial College of London, said in an interview. “The fingerprint is super strong.”

World Weather Attribution, a collection of scientists across the globe who do real-time studies of extreme weather to see whether climate change played a role in an extreme weather event and if so how much of one, looked at two-day average temperatures for July 18 and 19 in much of England and Wales and the highest temperature reached in that time.

The daily highest temperatures were the most unusual, a one-in-1,000-year event in the current warmer world, but “almost impossible in a world without climate change,” the study said. Last week’s heat smashed the old national record by 1.6 degrees Celsius. The average over two hot days and nights is a once a century event now but is “nearly impossible” without climate change.When the scientists used the long history of temperatures in England to determine the impact of global warming, they saw a stronger climate change influence than when they used simulations from climate models. For some reason that scientists aren’t quite certain about, climate models have long underestimated extreme weather signals in the summer in Western Europe, Otto said.

With climate models, the scientists simulate a world without the 1.2 degrees Celsius of warming since pre-industrial times and see how likely this heat would have been in that cooler world without fossil fuel-charged warming. With observations they look at history and calculate the chances of such a heat wave that way.

“The methodology seems sound, but candidly, I didn’t need a study to tell me this was climate change,” said University of Georgia meteorology professor Marshall Shepherd, who wasn’t on this study team but was on a U.S. National Academy of Sciences panel that said these types of studies are scientifically valid. “This new era of heat is particularly dangerous because most homes are not equipped for it there.”

The World Weather Attribution study refers to another analysis that estimates a heat wave like this would kill at least 800 people in England and Wales, where there is less air conditioning than in warmer climates.

Otto, who had to sleep and work in the basement because of the heat, said as the world warms, these record-smashing heat waves will continue to come more frequently and be hotter.

In addition to spurring people to cut greenhouse gas emissions, study co-author Gabe Vecchi said, “this heat wave and heat waves like it should be a reminder that we have to adapt to a warmer world. We are not living in our parents’ world anymore.”

Source: Voice of America

Trip.com and Ctrip celebrate the return of travel by announcing their strategic partnership with Hylink Digital

Hylink offers full-service advertising through its Travel + Travel Retail practice, Hylink Travel, will offer travel brands exclusive opportunities and resources on the Trip.com and Ctrip platform through our partnership

LOS ANGELES, July 27, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Hylink Digital (Hylink), a 30-year award-winning full-service global agency, was announced as the official strategic partner of Trip.com and Ctrip for the Americas (North and South America). This marks the first of its kind between an advertising agency and an international online travel agency.

As tourism returns, destination marketers, travel brands and travel marketers can expect not only more value from their existing services, but also better rates and exclusive access to inventory and content creation through this partnership.

“We have always had a deep relationship with Hylink, and this particular partnership is very timely as global travel resumes. We anticipate seeing a full recovery within the global travel center,” says Edison Chen, General Manager of Trip.com and Ctrip Partnerships.

In this historic year for travel, it is evident that the travel industry is changing, and the future of travel will look like partnerships like this one. “Trip.com’s business model works across all industries that intersect with travel, be it travel tourism, destination marketing, travel retail, healthcare, education, or travel brands,” says Humphrey Ho, Managing Partner, Americas at Hylink Digital.

Trip.com Group Limited
Website: https://us.trip.com/?locale=en_us
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Trip/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/trip/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Trip/
WeChat: https://pages.trip.com/images/social-media/wechatQRCode.png
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/TripOfficial

Hylink Digital
Website: https://hylinkgroup.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/hylinkdigital/?hl=en
Twitter: https://twitter.com/hylinkdigital
LinkedIn: https://fr.linkedin.com/company/hylink

About Trip.com Group
Trip.com Group Limited, formerly Ctrip.com International, is a Chinese multinational online travel company that provides services including accommodation reservation, transportation ticketing, packaged tours and corporate trave management.

Trip.com is A NASDAQ listed company since 2003 (NASDAQ: TCOM) with more than 1.4 million hotels in 200 countries and regions and a far-reach flight network of over 2 million flight routes connecting more than 5,000 cities around the world. The agency has built an extensive hotel and flight network that gives customers an array of global options.

About Hylink Digital Solutions
Hylink Digital (Hylink) is a fully integrated independent international advertising and communications agency with more than 20 offices worldwide and an American headquarters both in Los Angeles, California and in New York, New York. Ranked #1 Digital Agency by China Internet (CI) Weekly Magazine for 14 consecutive years in a row between 2008-2021. Hylink has also been a multi-year Effie China award recipient for Most Effective Independent Agency Network of the Year and was identified as a fastest growing agency by Adweek in 2021. Hylink Digital has won 32 awards at the 2021 Interactive Creative & Media Marketing Awards (formerly the Modern Advertising Awards).

Hylink comprises industry-leading units in the following disciplines: digital media, interactive creative, programmatic, SEM, content marketing and investment, EPR/social, research, and insights. Hylink services Fortune Global 500 companies, from both headquarters in China and the U.S., and has supporting offices globally. For more information, visit www.hylinkgroup.com, or follow Hylink on LinkedIn or Twitter at @hylinkdigital.

Media Contact: Alana Reid

Name: Alana Reid

Email: alana.reid@hylinkgroup.com

Trip.com et Ctrip célèbrent le retour des voyages en annonçant leur partenariat stratégique avec Hylink Digital

Hylink propose un service complet de publicité par le biais de ses activités Travel + Travel Retail, Hylink Travel, et proposera aux marques du secteur du voyage des opportunités et des ressources exclusives sur la plateforme Trip.com et Ctrip grâce à notre partenariat

LOS ANGELES, 28 juill. 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Hylink Digital (Hylink), une agence mondiale de services complets primée dont la création remonte à 30 ans, a été annoncée comme partenaire stratégique officiel de Trip.com et Ctrip pour l’Amérique du Nord et l’Amérique du Sud. Ce partenariat est le premier en son genre entre une agence de publicité et une agence de voyages en ligne internationale.

Avec le retour du tourisme, les spécialistes du marketing de destination, les marques du secteur du voyage et les spécialistes du marketing de voyage peuvent s’attendre grâce à ce partenariat non seulement à une plus grande valeur de leurs services existants, mais également à de meilleurs tarifs et à un accès exclusif à la création d’inventaires et de contenu.

« Nous avons toujours entretenu une relation étroite avec Hylink, et ce partenariat spécial arrive à point nommé alors que les voyages mondiaux reprennent. Nous prévoyons une reprise complète au sein du centre mondial du voyage », a déclaré Edison Chen, directeur général de Trip.com et Ctrip Partnerships.

Au cours de cette année historique pour les voyages, il est évident que l’industrie du voyage évolue, et l’avenir du voyage ressemblera à des partenariats comme celui-ci. « Le modèle commercial de Trip.com fonctionne dans tous les secteurs qui s’entrecroisent avec le voyage, qu’il s’agisse de voyages touristiques, du marketing de destination, du Travel Retail, des soins de santé, de l’éducation ou des marques du secteur du voyage », a déclaré Humphrey Ho, associé directeur des Amériques chez Hylink Digital.

Trip.com Group Limited
Site Web : https://us.trip.com/?locale=en_us
Facebook : https://www.facebook.com/Trip/
Instagram : https://www.instagram.com/trip/
Twitter : https://twitter.com/Trip/
WeChat : https://pages.trip.com/images/social-media/wechatQRCode.png
YouTube : https://www.youtube.com/c/TripOfficial

Hylink Digital
Site Web : https://hylinkgroup.com/
Instagram : https://www.instagram.com/hylinkdigital/?hl=en
Twitter : https://twitter.com/hylinkdigital
LinkedIn : https://fr.linkedin.com/company/hylink

À propos de Trip.com Group
Trip.com Group Limited, anciennement Ctrip.com International, est une société multinationale chinoise de voyage en ligne qui fournit des services comprenant la réservation d’hébergements, la billetterie de transport, les visites groupées et la gestion des voyages d’affaires d’entreprise.

Trip.com est une société cotée au NASDAQ depuis 2003 (NASDAQ : TCOM) avec plus de 1,4 million d’hôtels dans 200 pays et régions et un réseau aérien étendu de plus de 2 millions d’itinéraires de vol reliant plus de 5 000 villes à travers le monde. L’agence a élaboré un vaste réseau hôtelier et aérien, qui propose à ses clients un éventail d’options mondiales.

À propos d’Hylink Digital Solutions
Hylink Digital (Hylink) est une agence internationale indépendante entièrement intégrée de publicité et de communication comptant plus de 20 bureaux dans le monde entier et des sièges sociaux américains à Los Angeles, en Californie et à New York, dans l’état de New York. Agence numérique classée n° 1 par le magazine hebdomadaire China Internet (CI) pendant 14 années consécutives entre 2008 et 2021. Hylink a également reçu pendant plusieurs années le prix Effie China récompensant le Réseau d’agences indépendantes le plus efficace de l’année et a été reconnue comme l’agence à la croissance la plus rapide par Adweek en 2021. Hylink Digital a remporté 32 prix lors des Interactive Creative & Media Marketing Awards 2021 (anciennement les Modern Advertising Awards).

Hylink comprend des unités leaders du secteur dans les disciplines suivantes : médias numériques, création interactive, programmatique, SEM, marketing de contenu et investissement, EPR/social, recherche et informations. Hylink dessert les entreprises Fortune Global 500, depuis leur siège social en Chine et aux États-Unis, et possède des bureaux d’appui dans le monde entier. Pour tout complément d’information, veuillez consulter www.hylinkgroup.com, ou suivez Hylink sur LinkedIn ou Twitter sur @hylinkdigital.

Contact auprès des médias : Alana Reid

Nom : Alana Reid

E-mail : alana.reid@hylinkgroup.com