LONDON – The world’s first COVID-19 human challenge trial is due to start in London next year, after the government announced £33.6 million (US$43.5 million) funding for the project.
PERTH, Australia – Astrazeneca plc is leasing 175 Sozo devices from Impedimed Ltd. and plans to put them in 20 countries to run phase II trials for a combination drug that looks at fluid imbalance in the human body in patients with heart failure (HF) and chronic kidney disease.
LONDON – Clinical care guidelines recommending the use of the HIV/AIDS combination lopinavir-ritonavir for the treatment of patients hospitalized with COVID-19 must now be updated, say the authors of a paper reporting the full results of a randomized U.K. study.
With phase III vaccine trials nearly enrolled and data expected soon, a half-year of expedited development efforts, plus massive government funding may soon provide the ammunition needed to effectively stop the SARS-CoV-2 scourge of 2020.
HONG KONG – Cambridge, U.K.-based Astrazeneca plc has resumed phase I/II trials in Japan for AZD-1222, the experimental, adenovirus vector-based candidate coronavirus vaccine that it is co-developing with the University of Oxford.
HONG KONG – New data from Beigene Ltd. recently presented at the ESMO Virtual Congress 2020 showed its PARP inhibitor pamiparib helped shrink tumors in almost 65% of people with platinum-sensitive ovarian cancer treated with the candidate during a pivotal trial.
A new randomized controlled trial (RCT) of COVID-19 convalescent plasma (CCP) treatment for moderately ill COVID-19 patients run at 39 Indian hospitals found no association between CCP therapy and reduced mortality or progression to severe disease.
HONG KONG – Interim results of a phase I study CT-P59, an anti-COVID-19 monoclonal antibody being developed by Incheon, South Korea-based Celltrion Inc., have confirmed the candidate’s safety, tolerability and pharmacokinetics in healthy subjects, giving the company confidence to ramp up production of the experimental antiviral.
HONG KONG – Sanofi SA has finally ended its clinical development of Hanmi Pharmaceutical Co. Ltd.’s efpeglenatide as a type 2 diabetes treatment, and the Korean firm is now considering how to move forward with developing the once-weekly GLP-1 receptor agonist, which employs Hanmi's Lapscovery delivery technology.
LONDON – Results from two non-randomized phase I/II trials of the Russian COVID-19 vaccine Sputnik V that recently received conditional regulatory approval show both a frozen and a freeze-dried formulation of the two-shot vaccine had a good safety profile and induced antibody responses in all 76 participants within 21 days.