Interim results from Tiziana Life Sciences PLC (NASDAQ:TLSA, LSE:TILS, FRA:RTRA, OTC:TIZAF) revealed the significant progress made by the drug developer in the first half of the year.
In the six-month period to 30 June, the group was able to provide the first early demonstration that its monoclonal antibody (mAB) treatment, Foralumab, could be administered nasally using the local and lymphatic immune systems directly.
“These data support other clinical and pre-clinical studies showing that this route of administration is capable of inducing site-targeted immunomodulation and anti-inflammatory effects,” the company told investors.
“Furthermore, these pharmacodynamic data points to a clinical dose range that Tiziana intends to test in further clinical development among MS [multiple sclerosis] patients.”
Of course, Foralumab is the gift that keeps on giving. It is about to enter phase II proof-of-concept trials for the treatment of hospitalised Covid patients, and it is being administered on a named-patient basis to an American woman with secondary progressive MS.
Earlier this month, Tiziana has teamed up with Precision Biosciences to assess whether Foralumab might be used to improve the longer-term efficacy of CAR-T therapy.
Tiziana is also developing an inhaled version of TZLS-501, its other mAB candidate, which eventually will be deployed to treat autoimmune and inflammatory diseases.
Earlier this year, it announced that it was looking to find a partner in Japan and other Asian countries to develop Milciclib, a potential treatment for hepatocellular carcinoma, the most common type of liver cancer.
At the corporate level, Tiziana has begun to change its structure by establishing Tiziana Life Sciences Ltd, a Bermuda-incorporated company.
Financially, the group seems well set with £38.6mln in the bank as at 30 June, though it said it “continues to carefully manage its working capital position”.
It posted a loss of £12.6mln for the first half as it invested heavily in research and development.