Avaxia Biologics, Inc., a privately-held biotechnology company developing oral antibody drugs that act locally within the digestive tract, announced today that the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has cleared the Investigational New Drug (IND) application for AVX-470 for the treatment of ulcerative colitis. AVX-470 is an anti-TNF polyclonal antibody and is the first clinical candidate to come from Avaxia's oral antibody platform. The Company expects to initiate a Phase 1b clinical trial of AVX-470 in patients with active ulcerative colitis in the near term.
"Clearance of the IND allows us to advance AVX-470 into clinical development, which furthers our goal of providing patients afflicted with inflammatory bowel disease with a promising new treatment option," stated Barbara S. Fox, CEO of Avaxia. "Because AVX-470 is delivered directly to the GI tract, it has a lower potential for systemic immunosuppression than injectable anti-TNF therapies while potentially retaining the proven benefits of anti-TNF antibody therapy for inflammatory bowel disease."
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