THD News desk, New Delhi: On 18th of September, Eli Lily and Amgen, two of the pharmaceutical giants have announced a collaboration to manufacture antibodies for Lily’s potential COVID-19 antibody therapeutics.
Lily is currently undertaking a study of a lot of potent neutralizing antibodies. It would be used for the prevention or treatment of COVID-19 through either monotherapy or as a combination of both. The pharma companies are aiming at producing fast and effective results as soon as possible.
Through this collaboration, the pharma giants will have the means to increase production if one or more of Lilly’s antibody therapies shows encouraging results in clinical testing and receive the required government approval.
Daniel Skovronsky, Lilly’s Chief Scientific Officer and President of Lilly Research Laboratories said
“Based on our initial clinical studies, we believe that virus-neutralizing antibodies, including LY-CoV-555, could play an important role in the fight against COVID-19. Increasing the manufacturing capacity for our neutralizing antibodies through this collaboration with Amgen is a crucial next step, and together we hope to be able to produce many millions of doses even next year.”
And David M Reese, Executive VP of Research and Development at Amgen said,
“We are impressed with Lilly’s data, in particular the reduction in hospitalizations, and are enthusiastic about the potential for these neutralizing antibodies as a therapeutic for COVID-19.”
This collaboration has made both the companies prepare for a large scale production if and when the need arises for the manufacturing of potential antibody therapies.