CVS Corp. – based in Woonsocket, which acquired approximately 1,260 Eckerd drugstores in the transaction – said in a release that the FTC granted early termination of the waiting period under the Hart-Scott-Rodino Antitrust Improvements Act of 1976. CVS anticipates the Eckerd transaction will close around the end of this month.

J.C. Penney, the second-largest U.S. department store company behind Sears, Roebuck & Co., in April said it would sell the money-losing drugstore chain so it could speed improvements to J.C. Penney’s catalogs and department stores.

The sale makes CVS the biggest U.S. drugstore chain by outlets and the other buyer, Canada-based Jean Coutu Group Inc., the fourth-largest in the United States. (Bloomberg News)

Researchers: Prototype HIV vaccine a success

PROVIDENCE – Dr. Anne S. De Groot, founder of EpiVax Inc. and the GAIA Vaccine Foundation, announced that a prototype of a global HIV vaccine being developed by the company has been successful in mice with humanized immune systems.

“We’re excited this first go-through worked,” she said. “We’re going ahead with an improved version to get the best vaccine we can for humans.”

Results of the test, which were done at the University of Pennsylvania under the direction of Dr. David Weiner, show the universal qualities of the vaccine in that it can combat multiple versions of HIV.