Research Roundup: Marburg vaccine trial, generic HIV prevention shots, WHO recommends RSV prevention shots

Interested in more global health innovation news? Every week GHTC scours media reports worldwide to deliver essential global health R&D news and content to your inbox. Sign up now to receive our weekly R&D News Roundup email. Recently published results from a Phase 3 clinical trial support Pfizer and Abbvie’s aztreonam-avibactam as a potential treatment for patients with serious gram-negative bacterial infections and limited treatment options. Aztreonam-avibactam is a combination of two antibiotic drugs that work together to effectively fight off tricky bacteria resistant to nearly all currently available antibiotics. The treatment was approved in April by the European Medicines Agency based on the results of two previous Phase 3 clinical trials that investigated the treatment's efficacy in treating several types of multidrug-resistant infections.Last week, TB Alliance announced the award of a $7.35 million four-year grant from the US Department of Defense’s Congressionally Directed Medical Research Programs for the research and development of host-directed approaches for treating tuberculosis (TB). Host-directed approaches, which target the immune response of the host (the infected person) rather than directly targeting the bacteria, could reduce the likelihood of the emergence of drug resistance and, in combination with new TB drugs, could offer shorter and less long and burdensome treatment regimens for those with drug-resistance and drug-sensitive TB. Specifically, the project will work toward preclinical proof-of-concept for at least one novel adjunct TB host-directed therapy and one therapeutic vaccine.At the HIV Research for Prevention Conference last week, the Population Council announced the results of a Phase 1 trial conducted in South Africa, which suggest that the three-month dapivirine vaginal ring for HIV prevention will be as effective as the one-month ring. The three-month dapivirine vaginal ring, a flexible silicon ring self-inserted into the vagina that slowly releases an antiretroviral drug to prevent HIV infection, was found to deliver the drug at higher levels than the one-month ring. If the longer-acting ring continues to demonstrate success in future trials, it could offer a more cost-effective and convenient option for women—it is expected to reduce the cost per user by 60 percent.  

Interested in more global health innovation news? Every week GHTC scours media reports worldwide to deliver essential global health R&D news and content to your inbox. Sign up now to receive our weekly R&D News Roundup email. Two recent studies found that the virus that causes COVID-19 is developing resistance to two antiviral drugs commonly used for treatment in patients with compromised immune systems: remdesivir and nirmatrelvir. The first study from Cornell University and US National Institutes of Health researchers, which specifically looked at immunocompromised patients, found that the virus developed a reduced sensitivity to the drugs, while the second study from University of Pittsburgh, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Stanford University, and Harvard University researchers also found resistant mutations, with the effect more evident in the immunocompromised and those who had received nirmatrelvir. These results raise concerns as the threat of antimicrobial resistance globally grows.Researchers from the University of California, Riverside; the University of California, Irvine; and the Yale School of Medicine have designed a new synthetic compound, MED6-189, which is effective against drug-sensitive and drug-resistant Plasmodium falciparum malaria strains in vitro and in mice engineered to have human blood. MED6-189, inspired by a compound extracted from marine sponges, works by targeting and disrupting a specialized part of P. falciparum cells, as well as the pathways used to transport materials within the cells, thereby preventing the pathogen from developing resistance. The next steps include continued optimization of the MED6-189 and further confirmation of its mechanisms of action, but, if the compound continues to demonstrate success, this research could lead to the development of an important tool to address the rising challenge of antimalarial drug resistance.Last week, the US Department of Health and Human Services through the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health announced funding for the Transforming Antibiotic R&D with Generative AI to stop Emerging Threats project that will use artificial intelligence (AI) to speed up the discovery and development of new classes of antibiotics to meet the urgent need for new drugs amid the growing threat of antibiotic resistance. While conventional antibiotic discovery methods require time-consuming manual screening and testing of potential molecular compounds, most of which do not advance into further development, this project will employ deep learning to develop new methods to identify biomolecules with potential and use generative AI to expand the number of potential antibiotic candidates.