Former chief medical officer Tony Holohan has been appointed chair of the strategic advisory board of Irish cell therapy company aCGT Vector.

Dr Holohan, who retired from the Department of Health in July, joins the company along with Dr Aine Adams, formerly of Takeda's cell therapy division, who has been appointed head of cell therapy (manufacturing, science and technology).

"Tony is one of the outstanding and most respected public health professionals in Europe and we are delighted that he will head up our strategic advisory board where he will build and lead a team of leading healthcare, scientific and business professionals," said Gary McAuslan, CEO of aCGT Vector.

aCGT Vector is developing a network of cell therapy deployment pods within cancer hospitals, including St James's Hospital as its first operational facility.

The pods are self-contained units that can be dropped in or driven on to a hospital campus, and each of which brings miniaturised, right-sized pharma-grade CAR-T Therapy processing into or close to hospitals.

CAR-T therapy is a personalised precision cell therapy that has been used to treat 15,000 cancer patients globally to date. It is predicted the treatment will be used on two million patients per year by 2025 as a mainstream treatment for certain cancers.

Approximately 50 Irish patients have received CAR-T therapy, with the first 30 having to travel abroad and the remaining 20 being treated at St James's.

Bone marrow transplants were the original cell therapy, and the HSE spent €8.2m between 2019 and 2020 sending Irish patients to the UK for CAR-T therapy.

About 20-25 patients in Ireland are expected to benefit from its availability in Ireland this year, with the possibility that hundreds of Irish patients can benefit by 2030.

It is a logistically complex process that can take up to a six weeks, requiring patients T cells to be collected at St James's, frozen in a cryo laboratory and sent oversees by air to centralised CAR-T manufacturing plants.

The cells are re-engineered into CAR-T cells over a 14-21 day period to allow them to target specifically cancer cells before they are frozen, shipped back to St James's, thawed and infused back into the patent.

Dr Holohan commented: "aCGT Vector has the potential to transform patient access to cutting edge innovations in Cell Therapy in the fight against cancer and other rare diseases.  

"I’m delighted to work with Gary and his team to help create and lead an advisory board that strategically supports the business in the coming years.”   

aCGT was founded by McAuslan and Ivan Coulter in 2020, and the Drogheda company was a beneficiary of the €10.5m grant awarded by the government to the Haled Consortium to bring pharma standardisation for cancer cell therapies, knowns at GMP, to St James's last year.

Holohan was also appointed to a board position at Enfer Medical in recent weeks.

Photo (l-r): Gary McAuslan, Aine Adams and Tony Holohan.

Dr Tony Holohan, the former Chief Medical Officer, has been appointed chair of the medical advisory board at medical testing company Enfer Medical.

Holohan stepped down after 14 years as CMO in July 2022.

He led the response to the Covid-19 pandemic as head of the National Public Health Emergency Team (NPHET) and advised the government on the CervicalCheck scandal.

He had initially been expected to take up a position as professor of public health strategy and leadership at Trinity College, but decided against taking the role following outcry about his salary.

Enfer, led by Louis Ronan, said that Dr Holohan will chair its medical advisory board, which also includes medical consultants working in the healthcare system who advise the company on strategic direction.

It is understood that Holohan will work for Enfer on a part-time basis.

The Tipperary company provides laboratory services for healthcare providers.

Enfer received €122m from from the HSE in 2020 for testing, and was responsible for more than half the state's Covid testing capacity at the height of the pandemic.

Enfer Medical said in a statement: "The Medical Advisory Board supports the company in delivering its vision to provide transformative laboratory services which enhance personalised and population health for healthcare providers and their patients."

"The membership of the Medical Advisory Board includes medical consultants working within the Irish healthcare system, providing key insights to shape the strategic direction of the company and support true innovation in delivering laboratory healthcare solutions for Ireland’s tomorrow."

Photo: Dr Tony Holohan.

The Central Statistics Office  has issued figures showing that when Covid-19 claimants are classed as unemployed, the jobless rate in Ireland was 26.1% at end May 2020, according to its estimates.

Excluding Covid-19 Pandemic Unemployment Payment claimants, the seasonally-adjusted unemployment rate rose to 5.6% in May. In April, the CSO said the ‘real’ jobless rate was 28.2%.

Counting in 543,000 PUP recipients, 769,000 people were unemployed in Ireland at the end of May 2020.

The Live Register for May was 226,000, which is 43,000 higher than in February. This means that 586,000 people are currently out of work as direct result of the NPHET/government business lockdown strictures. All of them are from the private sector.

In addition, the CSO counted 436,000 individuals whose salaries and wages are being subsidised by the government subsidy scheme.

Grant Thornton chief economist Andrew Webb  commented that the scale of the impact on the labour market from Covid-19 is truly difficult to comprehend. 

“An unemployment rate of just over 5% mere weeks ago could now be considered as being higher than 26% if all claimants of the Pandemic Unemployment Payment were classified as unemployed," said Webb. T"he great fear over the coming weeks, as we hopefully move through the various stages of lifting lockdown, is how many of these ‘temporarily unemployed’ people have a job to return to.  

“There is a growing sense that we are heading for a deep and damaging downturn, with a longer climb back to economic strength than originally hoped. Much will depend on how the economy adapts to social distancing and how consumers feel about re-engaging in expenditure – two considerable unknowns at this point.”

Indeed economist Jack Kennedy added: “What will be crucial now is the impact on the unemployment rate as the economy begins to reopen. With small retailers and some other workplaces due to reopen next week, this new phase will test how successfully businesses can adapt to this new way of working while still turning a profit. Most people are hopeful that they will go back to their previous jobs, but this depends on how quickly businesses ramp up to full capacity.

“As the economy sputters to a start, it will be vital to ensure the infrastructure needed to support workers is also in place. Adequate public transport and childcare facilities for those returning to work will be some of the biggest challenges to maintain with social distancing.

“The danger remains for industries that may stay shut for some time, such as hospitality and tourism. It will be a challenge to ensure that many of those employed in these areas do not fall into long term unemployment."

Photo: Tony Holohan, Chief Medical Officer. (Pic: RollingNews.ie)