Open Orphan subsidiary hVIVO has signed a €5.8m study contract with a biotech company that’s developing an antiviral drug for protection against respiratory viral infections, focusing on influenza.

The study will commence later in 2022 and will test and assess the efficacy of a single dosing regimen of the client's antiviral drug, with healthy adult volunteers, using hVIVO’s influenza human challenge study model. Open Orphan expects the majority of revenues to be recognised in 2022.

Influenza is a serious global health threat, with an estimated one billion cases, three to five million severe cases, and 290,000 to 650,000 deaths each year. Healthy volunteer studies of wild-type influenza play a major role in the development of vaccines and therapeutics against the flu.

hVIVO says it has been studying influenza for more than 20 years and conducting influenza human challenge studies with its flu disease models for more than 15 years, making its models the most well-used commercial flu disease models available on the market.

Open Orphan executive chair Cathal Friel (pictured) commented: "We are delighted to be working with this biotech client to assess the efficacy of their antiviral product, which has the potential to be an important treatment against respiratory viral infections, using the hVIVO influenza human challenge study model.

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"We have now signed contracts for 95% of our 2022 forecast revenues. This is the fourth influenza human challenge study that we have signed in 2021 and, coupled with the contract wins that we have seen in other disease areas, this further underlines the growing interest in respiratory and infectious diseases within the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries, which we expect to continue over the coming years.”

The human challenge clinical trials are open for volunteers, he added: “By volunteering to take part in one of our studies in a safe, controlled, clinical environment under expertly supervised conditions you are playing your part to further medical research and help increase the understanding of respiratory illnesses.”

Apart from the seasonal flu, hVIVO conducts studies for a range of respiratory viruses, including various strains of flu, respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) and human rhinovirus HRV (common cold virus), malaria, and asthma. In October 2020, it expanded the list to include the SARS-CoV-2 virus.

Anyone who is interested in taking part in the flu trials can find out more here, while there’s more detail on the company’s Covid-19 human challenge research here.