Akero’s drug miss­es the mark in se­vere form of NASH

Akero Ther­a­peu­tics, part of a co­hort of biotechs at­tempt­ing to mark a turn­around in NASH drug de­vel­op­ment, did not pass the bar in a Phase IIb test of pa­tients with cir­rho­sis, the most se­vere form of the fat­ty liv­er dis­ease that is al­so known as stage F4.

The South San Fran­cis­co biotech’s lead drug, dubbed efrux­ifer­min, was not sta­tis­ti­cal­ly sig­nif­i­cant in beat­ing out place­bo in im­prov­ing liv­er scar­ring with­out wors­en­ing of NASH, Akero said be­fore Tues­day’s open­ing bell. At a 36-week analy­sis, the p-val­ues were 0.38 and 0.28 for the low and high dos­es, re­spec­tive­ly, ac­cord­ing to an in­vestor pre­sen­ta­tion.

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