Q BioMed Inc said it has received a Notice of Allowance for the patent of its Uttroside B asset in South Korea, adding to the patents already secured in Canada and Japan for the liver cancer chemotherapy candidate.
The company said recent results from pre-clinical pharmacokinetic testing on Uttroside B have also been very encouraging and the data supports advancing the program.
“Uttroside B shows tremendous value in the liver cancer market,” the company said in a statement. “Uttroside B has also received Orphan Drug designation from the FDA (US Food and Drug Administration)."
READ: Q BioMed secures further international protection for its liver cancer chemotherapy candidate
In early pre-clinical investigation, Q BioMed noted, Uttroside-B showed ten times the cytotoxicity against hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), which is the toxicity caused due to the action of the chemotherapeutic agent on living cancer cells, as compared to the current standard of care drug at the time.
The company noted that, according to cancer.com, an estimated 42,230 adults in the US will be diagnosed with primary liver cancer this year alone, with an estimated 30,230 deaths from the disease. The global liver cancer drug market size was valued at US$824 million in 2020 and is anticipated to grow at a compound annual growth rate of 29.4% from 2021 to 2030, it added.
Currently, there are only two approved first-line therapies for the cancer. Challenges with current treatments include patients becoming resistant to specific drugs, adverse side effects, and high costs.
Q BioMed is a biotech acceleration and commercial-stage company focused on licensing and acquiring undervalued biomedical assets in the healthcare sector. It provides these target assets with the strategic resources, developmental support, and expansion capital needed to ensure they meet their developmental potential, enabling them to provide products to patients in need.
Contact the author at stephen.gunnion@proactiveinvestors.com