Shares of nano-cap biopharma NanoViricides, Inc. NNVC were trading solidly higher Tuesday following a positive data readout.
What Happened: Two NanoViricides COVID-19 clinical drug candidates — NV-CoV-2 and NV-CoV-2-R — have shown "strong pan-coronavirus effectiveness" in preclinical studies, the company said.
Shelton, Connecticut-based NanoViricides is engaged in the development of antiviral therapies based on its nanomedicine technology platform.
NV-CoV-2 is the company's broad-spectrum, anti-coronavirus clinical lead candidate that is being evaluated for treating COVID-19 patients.
Additionally, the company is developing NV-CoV-2-R, which combines NV-CoV-2 and Gilead Sciences, Inc.'s GILD remdesivir. It is designed to attack both virus reinfection cycle outside cells and the virus replication cycle inside cells.
These two candidates were found to be highly effective in comparison to remdesivir in new cell culture studies.
NanoViricides studied the effectiveness of NV-CoV-2, NV-CoV-2-R and remdesivir against two unrelated human coronaviruses.
The effectiveness of the monotherapy and the combo therapy option indicates strong potential for the treatment of coronavirus diseases including COVID-19, irrespective of variants or coronavirus types, the company said.
Related Link: The Week Ahead In Biotech (Feb. 28-March 6): KemPharm, Gilead FDA Decisions and More Earnings
The encapsulation of remdesivir into the nanoviricide NV-CoV-2 should protect it from bodily metabolism and thereby enable strong clinical effectiveness of the combined drug against COVID-19 variants as well as Ebola and possibly many other viruses for the treatment of infected humans, the company said.
What's Next: NanoViricides said it intends to report on the results of these studies in its pre-investigational new drug application to the FDA to obtain guidance regarding human clinical trials for treatment of COVID-19 patients.
Additionally, the company said it is actively seeking opportunities to engage appropriate sites for human clinical trials. It is also engaged in the preparation of clinical trial protocols and other activities that would be necessary for submitting an IND application to the FDA.
NNVC Price Action: NanoViricides shares were trading 64.32% higher to $7 at last check Tuesday.
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