Alnylam Pharmaceuticals and Vir Biotechnology have announced that they intend to meet with the FDA soon regarding an IND for VIR-2703 (ALN-COV), an inhaled siRNA in development for prevention and/or treatment of COVID-19. The companies said that VIR-2703 may also have activity against other coronaviruses. The collaboration agreement between Vir and Alnylam includes development of as many as four RNAi therapeutic candidates for COVID-19.
Vir CEO George Scangos said, “Vir is committed to applying industry-leading technologies in our fight against COVID-19. Our fruitful and expansive collaboration with Alnylam has rapidly led to identification of a development candidate targeting SARS-CoV-2. With this candidate now in hand, we will further accelerate our efforts and plan to begin studies in humans at or around year-end. Our ultimate goal would be to provide rapid worldwide access, if approved, to an effective therapeutic to combat COVID-19.”
Alnylam CEO John Maraganore commented, “I’m very proud of the quality and pace of work done by our scientists and with our collaborators at Vir to identify an RNAi therapeutic development candidate targeting the SARS-CoV-2 genome. To our knowledge, this is one of the most potent direct-acting antivirals targeting SARS-CoV-2 reported to date. As this pandemic continues to unfold, we are committed to acting with the utmost urgency to broaden and accelerate our efforts to develop investigational RNAi therapeutics against COVID-19, and potentially future coronavirus-mediated diseases.”
Read the Alnylam Pharmaceuticals and Vir Biotechnology press release.
