AbCellera Biologics Inc (ABCL)

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AbCellera (NASDAQ:ABCL) today announced the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has expanded the Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) for bamlanivimab (LY-CoV555) 700 mg administered with etesevimab (LY-CoV016) 1400 mg to include post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP) to prevent SARS-CoV-2 infection or symptomatic COVID-19. The neutralizing antibodies, which were authorized together by the FDA in February 2021 to treat early COVID-19 infection, can now also be used together to treat high-risk individuals 12 years of age and older who have not been fully vaccinated against COVID-19 or are not expected to mount an adequate immune response to complete vaccination, and have been exposed to someone infected with SARS-CoV-2 or who are at high risk of exposure in an institutional setting, including a nursing home or prison.

"The expanded use authorization for bamlanivimab together with etesevimab provides a way to protect the significant number of people who, because of their situational exposure risk or medical condition, remain vulnerable to COVID-19," said Carl Hansen, Ph.D., CEO and President of AbCellera. "More than 535,000 patients have been treated with bamlanivimab alone or together with etesevimab, potentially keeping more than 25,000 patients out of the hospital and saving more than 10,000 lives. With this expanded authorization, these antibodies, which have been shown to be effective against the highly contagious Delta variant, can now be used to protect some of the most at-risk people exposed to the virus."

The expanded EUA is based on data from the Phase 3 BLAZE-2 trial that showed bamlanivimab prevented COVID-19 in nursing homes, reducing the risk of contracting the disease by up to 80 percent in nursing home residents and up to 57 percent among residents and staff of long-term care facilities. Eli Lilly and Company's (Lilly) study was conducted in partnership with the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), and the COVID-19 Prevention Network (CoVPN).

Pseudovirus and authentic virus studies demonstrate that bamlanivimab and etesevimab together retain neutralization activity against the Alpha and Delta variants. On September 2nd, the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response (ASPR), alongside the FDA, resumed the shipment and distribution of bamlanivimab and etesevimab administered together.

For information about the use of bamlanivimab and etesevimab together for the treatment and prevention of mild to moderate COVID-19 in high-risk patients under the FDA's emergency use authorization, please click here or contact Lilly's 24-hour support line at 1-855-LillyC19 (1-855-545-5921).

About AbCellera's Response to COVID-19

AbCellera initially mobilized its pandemic response platform against COVID-19 in March of 2020, resulting in the discovery of bamlanivimab, the first monoclonal antibody therapy for COVID-19 to reach human testing and to be authorized for emergency use by the FDA. Bamlanivimab alone and together with other antibodies has treated hundreds of thousands of patients, preventing COVID-19-related hospitalizations and death.

AbCellera's ongoing efforts to respond to the COVID-19 pandemic have identified thousands of unique anti-SARS-CoV-2 human antibodies. These include bamlanivimab, bebtelovimab, and other antibodies that are in various stages of testing by AbCellera and its partners.

AbCellera's pandemic response capabilities were developed over the past three years as part of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) Pandemic Prevention Platform (P3) program. The goal of the P3 program is to establish a robust technology platform for pandemic response capable of developing field-ready medical countermeasures within 60 days of isolation of an unknown viral pathogen.