Humanigen shares splinter on lenzilumab failure in COVID-19

Californian cytokine storm specialist Humanigen (Nasdaq: HGEN) lost 80% of its market value on Wednesday based on the results of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases’ (NIAID) ACTIV-5/BET-B trial.

This study is evaluating Humanigen’s lenzilumab plus remdesivir, a drug marketed by Gilead Sciences (Nasdaq: GILD) as Veklury, versus placebo plus remdesivir in hospitalized COVID-19 patients.

"Not able to confirm the positive results we saw in our Phase III LIVE-AIR study"The trial failed to achieve statistical significance on the primary endpoint, which was measured by the number of patients aged under 85 years with baseline CRP who remained alive and did not need mechanical ventilation through day 29.