Atossa Therapeutics Inc. (NASDAQ: ATOS) is the newest company to join the fight against COVID-19. Its shares surged early on Thursday after the company announced plans to develop a therapy for the novel coronavirus.
The company announced a new drug development program called COVID-19 Hope that uses a novel combination of two drugs that have been previously approved by the FDA for other diseases.
The goal of the COVID-19 Hope program is to develop a therapy to improve lung function and reduce the amount of time that COVID-19 patients are on ventilators.
The intended primary function of the drug combination is to mimic the function of the antibodies formed from a vaccine by blocking the ability of the virus to enter the target cells. This is increasingly important as a vaccine may not be available for more than a year.
Currently, Atossa has filed comprehensive provisional patent applications related to AT-H201 and intends to apply to the FDA under its Coronavirus Treatment Acceleration Program for approval to commence a clinical study.
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Dr. Steven Quay, president and CEO, commented:
The rapidly increasing number of COVID-19 patients needing mechanical ventilation is deeply worrisome, as more than one-third of these patients will never recover lung function and will die on the ventilator. The problem is confounded by the fact that hospitals may soon be facing a ventilator shortage and a vaccine could take more than a year to develop. The two drugs we intend to combine, which we call AT-H201, have been approved by the FDA for other diseases and are supported by a dozen clinical studies in close to 800 patients. We plan to quickly initiate and complete clinical studies so that we can obtain FDA approval to bring this treatment to market as soon as possible.
Atossa Therapeutics stock traded up about 64%, at $2.50 in a 52-week range of $0.76 to $4.26. The consensus price target is $4.00.
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