Vir’s GSK-al­lied flu pre­ven­tion an­ti­body fails PhII, sink­ing shares and late-stage hope

Vir Biotech­nol­o­gy’s in­fluen­za an­ti­body has failed a crit­i­cal Phase II clin­i­cal tri­al, which could spell bad news for its part­ner GSK, who has the op­tion to take over de­vel­op­ment of VIR-2482.

A flop on the mid-stage PENIN­SU­LA tri­al, fund­ed in part by a $55 mil­lion boost from the fed­er­al gov­ern­ment, throws a wrench in the San Fran­cis­co biotech’s speedy in­fluen­za R&D. The mon­o­clon­al an­ti­body flunked at pre­vent­ing in­fluen­za A ill­ness on a va­ri­ety of de­f­i­n­i­tions of flu — the pro­to­col’s, the CDC’s and the World Health Or­ga­ni­za­tion’s — in healthy adults who had not re­ceived a flu vac­cine. The com­pa­ny said the an­ti­body was “gen­er­al­ly well tol­er­at­ed and no safe­ty sig­nals were iden­ti­fied.”

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