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news.Adventrx Pharmaceuticals has reported that preclinical results of ANX-201, the company's broad-spectrum antiviral product candidate, demonstrate a unique resistance profile for ANX-201 and suggest suppression of resistance to nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitors, a commonly used class of drugs to treat HIV.
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The preclinical data show that virus selected for resistance to ANX-201 develop genetic mutations, some previously described for foscarnet-resistant virus, as well as unique genetic mutations not previously linked to foscarnet or foscarnet derivatives. Regardless of the specific mutations, the preclinical studies show that ANX-201-resistant virus was sensitive, and in most cases hypersusceptible, to multiple NRTIs and non-nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitors (NNRTIs). The nature of the resistance mutations suggest that, if patients develop resistance to ANX-201, they may be resensitized and made hypersusceptible to NRTIs or NNRTIs.
The preclinical studies also show that virus coresistant to ANX-201 and NRTI could not be generated, which supports the mutually exclusive resistance mechanism of these two drug classes. This suggests that patients treated with ANX-201 combined with NRTIs may be less likely to develop, or have a delay in development of, treatment-resistance.
Activity of ANX-201 was also examined using the PhenoSense assay against a panel of clinical isolates containing viruses that had developed varying degrees of resistance to NRTIs and/or NNRTIs. All clinical isolates tested were sensitive to ANX-201, the majority being hypersusceptible. This suggests that patients infected with viruses that are NRTI- or NNRTI-resistant may be hypersusceptible to ANX-201.