The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has announced it will purchase 10,000 therapeutic courses of treatment of Anthrax Immune Globulin (AIG) from Cangene Corporation of Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada for a total of $143,833,719.
This acquisition is via modifications to an existing contract for anthrax therapeutics awarded to Cangene last September.
Deliveries of AIG to the Strategic National Stockpile are expected to begin in 2007. Under the terms of the agreement, full payment to Cangene is contingent on the product receiving authorization for marketing in the U.S. from the Food and Drug Administration, but permits delivery of the product before licensing for emergency use should it be needed.
"Our first line of defense against anthrax is antibiotics," said HHS Assistant Secretary for Public Health Emergency Preparedness, RADM Craig Vanderwagen, M.D. "While additional studies are underway to determine its efficacy and ultimate role in treatment, AIG may have the potential to provide physicians with a source of human antibodies against the anthrax toxin that could improve the management of patients with the life-threatening toxemia associated with severe anthrax."
Despite treatment with highly active antibiotics there is still a significant mortality from inhalational anthrax. Toxins produced by the anthrax bacteria are believed to be a major cause of this mortality. AIG is a potentially promising addition to the array of medical countermeasures and will be available in the Strategic National Stockpile for emergency usage to try to prevent and mitigate the disease-causing effects of anthrax.