Altimmune's obesity hopes slimmed down by setback

Shares in Altimmune (Nasdaq: ALT) lost more than half of their value on Tuesday.

The US biopharma earlier announced top-line results from a week 24 interim analysis of 160 subjects in its 48-week MOMENTUM Phase II obesity trial of pemvidutide.

Of most concern to investors was likely the figure that, at the strongest 2.4mg dosage of pemvidutide, as many as 11, or 27%, of patients discontinued treatment due to adverse events (AEs). This was 10 times higher than the rate with placebo and around three times higher than the rate with the weaker two doses, of 1.2mg and 1.8mg.