Eli Lilly, an Indiana-based drug manufacturing company, announced Tuesday it would be pausing its COVID-19 clinical trial, ACTIV-3, until further notice, according to a statement from the company. The recommendation to stop the trial came from the independent data safety monitoring board, which monitors the trials and cited safety concerns, according to the statement.
The ACTIV-3 trial was studying the effects of Lilly’s neutralizing antibody bamlanivimab on hospitalized COVID-19 patients, according to the statement. The study is sponsored by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, a branch of the National Institute of Health.
The ACTIV-3 study is currently the only study being conducted by Lilly on COVID-19 patients who have been hospitalized, according to the statement. These patients have therefore been infected with the coronavirus longer and could have more severe symptoms than patients in other trials. This advanced stage of the virus could be why hospitalized patients benefit less from neutralized antibodies, according to the release.
The paused ACTIV-3 trial will not affect other trials being conducted by Lilly, according to the statement. Trials will continue for patients recently diagnosed with mild to moderate COVID-19 and those recently diagnosed in the outpatient setting. Lilly will also continue a trial of a drug for prevention of COVID-19 in residents and staff at long-term care facilities, according to the statement.
Other drug manufacturing companies also announced their COVID-19 vaccine trials were temporarily suspended. Vaccine trials conducted by Johnson & Johnson and Astrazeneca have also been paused due to safety concerns after patients from both trials developed unrelated illnesses, according to the IndyStar.
CORRECTION: A previous version of this article mislabeled the ACTIV-3 trial as a vaccine trial. It is instead a clinical trial involving an antibody. The IDS regrets these errors.
