Eli Lilly’s coronavirus antibody treatments could be available by September
pharmafile | June 11, 2020 | News story | Business Services | COVID, COVID-19, coronavirus
An antibody therapy for coronavirus could be available from Eli Lilly as early as September, according to one of its chief scientists.
Eli Lilly already has two human trials with the experimental antibody treatments in development, and is doing a third that is in a preclinical study, aiming for a human trial within the coming weeks. These drugs are made up of monoclonal antibodies which are widely used in the treatment of arthritis, cancer and many other conditions. It is speculated such a treatment will be more effective in reducing the potency of COVID-19 compared to medicines like hydroxychloroquine or remdisvir which have been repurposed to treat the virus.
Eli Lilly is working with AbCellera and Shaghai Junshi Biosciences on its two treatments in human trials with both working by blocking the virus’s spike protein which it uses to enter human cells then replicate itself. The third treatment in the preclinical stage focuses on a different part of the virus and will be potentially tested in combination with one or both of the other antibody treatments.
Eli Lilly’s Chief Scientific Officer Daniel Skovronsky commented on the antibody development and said: “For the treatment indication, particularly, this could go pretty fast. If in August or September we’re seeing the people who got treated are not progressing to hospitalization, that would be powerful data and could lead to emergency use authorization. So that puts you in the fall time: September, October, November is not unreasonable.”
Eli Lilly and AbCellera are also working with the US National Institutes of Health to identify promising compounds.
Conor Kavanagh
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