Thanks to vaccines, treatments, and preventive measures, the Covid crisis has eased, even if the pernicious virus persists. The pandemic’s evolution gives healthcare companies a chance to focus on other issues, including drug-patent expirations, pricing pressures, regulatory changes, and deal making. For investors, a bear market in stocks adds another wrinkle—and an opportunity to snap up shares of the industry’s most promising companies on the cheap.
This year, Barron’s annual healthcare roundtable focuses on emerging themes across the industry, from the ability to “interrogate” biology with computational tools to the evolution of value-based care. The challenges are many, but the news is good, not only for innovative biotech and cash-rich pharmaceutical companies, but also for nimble managed-care providers and purveyors of much-needed medical devices and life-sciences tools.
