Coronavirus - GS-441524 a promising Covid-19 Treatment stalled - will Gilead and the FDA help Texas University cancer researchers find out the truth ?

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In May 2020 Cancer researchers from the University of Texas set out in some detail why Gileads drug GS-441524 was superior to Gileads Remdesivir as a Coronavirus treatment. This was based both on animals trials and previous research on GS-441524. In some animals trials GS-441524 was compared directly with Remdesivir, as an anti coronavirus treatment, with GS-441524 becoming the preferred treatment.

Gilead developed Remdesivir with the FDA, however it is much more complicated and expensive to make than GS-441524 and could be less effective but for numerous reasons Gilead will make more money from Remdesivir and the FDA may also has a financial interest in remdesivir.

Critics say a long known promising Covid-19 treatment GS-441524 has not been studied and that it was delibrately blocked, for profit reasons, from Covid-19 researchers, having proper access to all the information on it.

Prior lab studies have shown that GS-441524 is effective against coronaviruses SARS, MERS and FIP a near 100% fatal cat coronavirus that GS-441524 had a near 100% cure rate for.

Gileads' responses have not addressed the points raised nor whether Gilead is promoting remdesivir because of its longer patent or why Gilead blocked and/or also had not encouraged or helped anyone researching the medical effectiveness of GS-441524 to resolve matters.

Gilead has for a some years also refused to explain why it has not allowed the manufacture or licensing of GS-441524 for use in cats after successful animal trials cured cats of a fatal coronavirus disease


A journalist writing in The Atlantic said "After Ebola trials in previous years found little benefit, remdesivir became a drug in search of a (human) disease."

Some years ago GS-441524 and Remdesivir were both tested against FIP a 95% fatal cat coronavirus.

Gilead was involved in these University of California animal tests providing the 25+ different drugs initially screened for use in the trials and credited in the published research.

The trials showed both remdesivir and GS-441524 were effective against FIP however GS-441524 was preferred and cured 100% of the coronavirus infected cats in the university tests. Later field tests on pet cats confirmed GS-441524s effectiveness

Strangely Gilead has refused to allow anyone to make or legally use GS-441524 on cats (or any animals or humans) despite repeated requests related to cats

Thus long before Covid-19 cat owners were forced to buy GS-441524 on the black market to treat their cats and Gilead did nothing nor provided any explaination

Critics say Gilead blocks GS-441524 as it is easier and cheaper to make and so will compete against Remdesivir meaning Gilead will make less money

Following Gileads and the FDAs focus on remdesivir and their failure to enter into meaningful discussions or research on GS-441524, an open letter was written to the FDA and Gilead by a citizens advocacy group asking

why GS-441524 was not being studied as a Covid-19 treatment and

that the FDA and others be encouraged to do research or

to explain why it was not scientifically and medically possible to do so.

The citizens group writing the letter has formally raised medical and other matters over many years, is non political and has been critical of both the Trump administration and the FDA and their response to covid-19 and other citizens rights matters. For example they separately launched legal action against the FDA over what is said to be an unsafe medical device that the FDA failed to withdraw.

The FDA has just responded to the GS-441524 coronavirus research letter saying that they have now

“reviewed the literature and agree that this compound merits further exploration,”

View: https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1297572580853915648


The questions the seem important are

why has it taken so long to start this work,

why did it take a citizens group not doctors or researchers or health officials to get this to happen and

will others also now be encouraged to also do research or will it remain a limited work within the FDA

will Gilead do all it can to help serious researchers resolve if GS-441524 is more effective than remdesivir

does the FDA have a financial interest in remdesivir which is why it favors that drug

Gilead has yet to indicate that it will allow others outside the FDA to view any data it or the FDA holds or encourage third party research.

Research indicates that GS-441524 is less toxic than remdesivir so can be given in higher doses and is much easier to make than remdesivir plus has many other benefits over remdesivir.

Texas University researchers have responded to questions about why GC-441524 is probably superior - see statnews article already linked from May 2020 and the following q&a posted


A private Dr highlighted GS-441524 in Feb 2020 in a Tampa Fl news article.

According to journalists and others Gilead has not responded to requests to clarify its position on allowing GS-441524 for the treatment for cats and seems unwilling to provide any meaningful response to requests for clarification on a range of matters about GS-441524 including encouraging meaningful covid-19 research. Gileads responses have focused on stressing remdesivir benefits or passing comments about any researching of GS-441524

Gilead and the FDA jointly developed the drug Remdesivir however Gilead registered the patent without including any FDA rights though later published research papers clearly list the many government scientists involved


GS-441524 was also developed and patented with other parties and is a very similar drug to remdesivir. The Gilead patent life for Remdesivir is 7+ years longer than the GS-441524 patent and for other reasons the GS-441524 patent may be less profitable for Gilead.

Gilead has prior history of trying to exclude the FDA from participating in patent royalities the FDA contributed to developing.


In a letter to leadership of Gilead Sciences, Inc., the National Institutes of Health, the Food and Drug Administration, and the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority, Public Citizen and two scientists specializing in cancer drug development offer a detailed summary of scientific evidence suggesting that the experimental antiviral drug GS-441524 may be a better drug than the closely-related drug remdesivir to treat COVID-19. The letter asks Gilead and the federal agencies either to work collaboratively to promptly pursue the development of GS-441524 as a treatment for COVID-19 or to publicly explain and provide evidence as to why doing so is not scientifically or medically feasible.

The links to the open letter to Gilead and the FDA and other articles and info are below


Open letter to Gilead and FDA



FDA response

View: https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1297572580853915648


“reviewed the literature and agree that this compound merits further exploration,”

Michael Abrams Phd , health researcher at Public Citizen and lead author of the letter to the FDA states “Such further study of the drug is long overdue, especially given the evidence that GS-441524 may be cheaper and easier to manufacture and more amenable to administration in inhaled or oral forms than remdesivir.”

“We hope that Gilead will respond similarly and commit to working collaboratively with the NIH to study the potential of GS-441524, even if it means the company may reap lower profits than expected from the marketing of remdesivir,” Abrams added.



Research on GS-441524


Lab tests have suggested GS-441524 is active against SARS-CoV-2, and it is apparently similar or superior to the effects of remdesivir at levels that do not cause much toxicity, according to the Anderson researchers, who want to run their own tests. They also maintain the compound is more easily synthesized than remdesivir, so it should be easier to create oral versions and make higher doses.


The nucleoside analog GS-441524 strongly inhibits feline infectious peritonitis (FIP) virus in tissue culture and experimental cat infection studies

10 cats were infected with FIP and then treated with GS-441524. All 10 cats recovered.

Department of Pathology, Microbiology, and Immunology, School of Veterinary Medicine, University of California, Davis, CA, USA

Gilead Sciences, Foster City, CA, USA

Accepted 14 April 2018



Current knowledge about the antivirals remdesivir (GS-5734) and GS-441524 as therapeutic options for coronaviruses
Susan Amirian
Julie K.Levy

Public Health & Healthcare Program, Texas Policy Lab, School of Social Sciences, Rice University, Houston, TX, USA

Maddie's Shelter Medicine Program, College of Veterinary Medicine, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL, USA

Accepted 24 March 2020,



The Atlantic

The background to the long term Cat research GS-441524 and the treatment people are using to cure cats of a deadly coronavirus that kills around 95% of infected cats

Around 5 years ago Gilead sent University researchers 25 or 30 molecules, drawn from the large library of drug candidates that pharmaceutical companies typically maintain.

Two of the molecules worked marvelously in cat cells infected with the FIP virus: GS-441524 and GS-5734, the latter of which is now better known as remdesivir.

After Ebola trials found little benefit, remdesivir became a drug in search of a (human) disease.

Both molecules were effective, so Pedersen decided to pursue the simpler one, GS-441524. He then infected 10 cats with FIP and dosed them with GS-441524. All 10 cats recovered.

“We almost fell out of our chairs,” says Weigner.

in a follow-up field trial of 31 pets with naturally acquired FIP, 25 ultimately made it—an unheard-of recovery rate.

Despite the success, Gilead refused to license GS-441524 for use in cats.

While Pedersen was testing GS-441524 in cats, a different virus—a human virus—was raging halfway around the world in West Africa: Ebola. The virus that causes Ebola is not a coronavirus, but remdesivir is unusually broad-acting for an antiviral, and early results against Ebola were promising. So promising, in fact, that the company was eyeing FDA approval of remdesivir in humans.

According to Pedersen, Gilead worried that the cat research could impede the approval process for remdesivir. Because GS-441524 and remdesivir are so similar, any adverse effects uncovered in cats might have to be reported and investigated to guarantee remdesivir’s safety in humans.

Gilead’s caution about generating unnecessary cat data is standard industry practice. “One of the rules in drug development is never perform a test you don’t have to, if the results could be problematic,” says Richard Sachleben, a retired pharma-industry researcher.

(Gilead declined to comment for this story.)




Pharmalot
The U.S. government contributed research to a Gilead remdesivir patent — but didn’t get credit
By Ed Silverman @Pharmalot
May 8, 2020

September 2015 in which Gilead sought a U.S. patent for a using the compound for any number of coronavirus infections. Although the code Gilead assigned to the compound – GS-5734 – does not appear in the body of the application, experts who have reviewed the chemical structure say the compound is remdesivir.

One month later, some of the same Gilead employees whose names appeared on the patent application were listed as co-authors on a Nature research paper – along with numerous government scientists – showing remdesivir, specifically, held promise in fighting Ebola and other coronaviruses. The paper also noted testing was conducted at high-risk security labs run by the federal government.

The role played by the federal government in developing remdesivir to combat coronaviruses has, in fact, involved various grants to universities, as well as contributions from government personnel at such agencies as the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases, according to Knowledge Ecology International, an advocacy group that first disclosed these connections.

But while it remains unclear the extent to which federal funds contributed to the R&D, the patent is of particular interest because it is tangible evidence that government work yielded something of potential financial value to the company. Yet government employees are not listed as inventors, which one expert suggested should be corrected, especially in an era when federally financed research might be leveraged to collect royalties or, arguably, lower the price of medicines.

“In this case, all of these scientists were really working together very intimately on research that led to the molecule,” said Arti Rai, a Duke University law professor who specializes in intellectual property and a former U.S. Patent and Trademark Office official, who is researching remdesivir patents and the role played by the federal government.

“Gilead actually had a huge number of patents on the molecules, but had to do a tremendous amount of work to figure out which variations of the various molecules would work against the biological models the government had. This patent illustrates the essence of why collaboration between the public and private sectors is important, not just in terms of money, such as grants, but resources.”

“What really matters is how much money the government has put into research, but if their names were on there, it would help to make the case there was a lot of in-kind contribution from the government,” she explained. “Right now, if Gilead tried to assert rights (in response to a patent challenge), there would be no way to know there was some government right to a license to the patent.”

Generally, one must play connect the dots to find government assistance. For instance, the National Institutes of Health gave grants to several universities whose researchers worked with Gilead scientists. Their efforts appeared in a 2018 paper in the American Society for Microbiology, which found remdesivir can combat coronaviruses, noted Tahir Amin, who heads the Initiative for Medicines, Access, and Knowledge, an advocacy group that challenged various Gilead patents on hepatitis C medicines.

We asked Gilead, which several months ago sought to add claims to the patent, for comment and will update you accordingly.

Numerous consumer advocates, academics, and lawmakers have argued that prescription drugs invented with taxpayer dollars should be affordable to Americans. Public Citizen estimated that U.S. taxpayers contributed $70.5 million to remdesivir R&D overall.

“Since we’re paying for the research, we shouldn’t expect to be at disadvantage,” said Jamie Love of Knowledge Ecology International. “The argument that you have to have a high price because a company made big investments is harder to justify when there was a large public financing role in the R&D. A high company may say a high price is necessary, but the rationale falls apart when we’re paying for the R&D.”

Gilead has often been at the center of such debates. As noted previously, the drug maker and the federal government filed dueling lawsuits over patents that formed the basis of a best-selling HIV prevention pill called Truvada. The government claims Gilead should pay royalties on its patents, which stemmed, in part, from taxpayer funding, while the company has argued the government patents are invalid.


Feb 2020 news article on GS-441524
By Dr. Joette Giovinco

Dr. Joette Giovinco wrote a press article highlighting GS-441524 in Feb 2020 as a promising Covid-19 treatment




Remdesivir is a promising antiviral drug and works by inhibiting the activity of RNA dependent RNA polymerase (RdRp).

GS-441524 is a feline infectious peritonitis virus (FIPV) inhibitor and a predominant metabolite of Remdesivir that is superior to Remdesivir against COVID-19.

First GS-441524 shows comparable efficacy in cell-based models of primary human lung and cat cells infected with the coronavirus. GS-441524 could strongly inhibit feline infectious peritonitis virus (FIPV), with an EC50of 0.78 μM.

Recent research in coronavirus-infected nonhuman primates demonstrated problems with remdesivir that inadvertently showed the antiviral effectiveness of GS-441524. In multiple studies testing remdesivir in coronavirus-infected mice or rhesus macaques, it was rapidly converted to GS-441524 in the bloodstream..... injection of remdesivir in NHP results in GS-441524 being present in serum at concentrations 1000-fold higher than remdesivir throughout a 7-day treatment course (Figure 3b).

Last but not the least, GS-441524 is capable of treating cats suffering from feline infectious peritonitis (FIP) with a 96% cure rate. Importantly, coupled with the robust antiviral activity of GS-441524 against FIP, these data compel further investigations into the therapeutic and prophylactic utility of GS-441524 against SARS-CoV-2.

All in all, GS-441524, a FIPV inhibitor, is a predominant metabolite of Remdesivir and superior to Remdesivir against COVID-19.







GILEAD owns patent rights to GS-441524 (2009) and Remdesivir (2017); The 2009 patent of GS-441524 may be invalid due to prior art: as we have seen in the GILEAD vs MERK trial (which Merk initially won), there is a large amount of prior art in the nucleoside space that may invalidate the GS-441524 patent.


Covid-19 treatnent research drug GC376

A final thought - great research is being done on Covid-19 some of it is below on another drug also tested on cats with FIP. However this drug GC376 was much less successful than GS-441524

The researchers of GC376 are clearly very good and professional

However how is it Covid-19 treatment research can be done on GC376 with cat coronavirus FIP treatment effectiveness being cited as one of the reasons for rapid research, and yet this not happen on GS-441524 when its almost 100% effective against the cat coronavirus FIP and worked well against other coronaviruses plus GS-441524 is potentially better than remdesivir ?

antiviral GC376 out of Kansas State University had previously been tested but only seven out of 20 cats had gone into remission. Those results seemed impressive at the time, but GS-441524 appeared to be even better

"Relapses no longer responsive to treatment occurred in 13 of these 19 cats within 1-7 weeks of initial or repeat treatment(s). Severe neurologic disease occurred in 8/13 cats that failed treatment and five cats had recurrences of abdominal lesions. At the time of writing, seven cats were in disease remission."


Research on GC376


Published: 27 August 2020

Feline coronavirus drug GC376 inhibits the main protease of SARS-CoV-2 and blocks virus replication


GC376 has been used to successfully treat FIP in cats as its breakdown product, GC373, effectively inhibits the Mpro of FCoV. Analogs of these drugs also inhibited the MERS CoV Mpro and blocked viral replication in cells at an EC50 of 0.5 μM14. Our studies show GC376 and GC373 to be effective inhibitors of SARS-CoV-2 Mpro, in agreement with previous studies showing GC373 and GC376 possess broad specificity against the Mpro of coronaviruses and calciviruses (Supplementary Table 2)10,13,14,22. Clearly, these drugs need to be advanced quickly into human trials for COVID-19. SARS-CoV-2 is the cause of COVID-19 and is a virus with a significant mutation rate23. Also, in some patients the virus has persisted longer than 2 months with some possibility of re-infection24. Vaccines are critically important, but still likely a year or more away as this virus may present vaccine challenges.

There are many clinical trials testing drugs re-purposed from their original indications. Remdesivir, a polymerase inhibitor developed as a treatment for Ebola virus25 had initially been used in compassion cases, and is now FDA approved for emergency use in patients with COVID-19......

 
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In May 2020 Cancer researchers from the University of Texas set out in some detail why Gileads drug GS-441524 was superior to Gileads Remdesivir as a Coronavirus treatment. This was based both on animals trials and previous research on GS-441524. In some animals trials GS-441524 was compared directly with Remdesivir, as an anti coronavirus treatment, with GS-441524 becoming the preferred treatment.

Gilead developed Remdesivir with the FDA, however it is much more complicated and expensive to make than GS-441524 and could be less effective but for numerous reasons Gilead will make more money from Remdesivir and the FDA may also has a financial interest in remdesivir.

Critics say a long known promising Covid-19 treatment GS-441524 has not been studied and that it was delibrately blocked, for profit reasons, from Covid-19 researchers, having proper access to all the information on it.

Prior lab studies have shown that GS-441524 is effective against coronaviruses SARS, MERS and FIP a near 100% fatal cat coronavirus that GS-441524 had a near 100% cure rate for.

Gileads' responses have not addressed the points raised nor whether Gilead is promoting remdesivir because of its longer patent or why Gilead blocked and/or also had not encouraged or helped anyone researching the medical effectiveness of GS-441524 to resolve matters.

Gilead has for a some years also refused to explain why it has not allowed the manufacture or licensing of GS-441524 for use in cats after successful animal trials cured cats of a fatal coronavirus disease


A journalist writing in The Atlantic said "After Ebola trials in previous years found little benefit, remdesivir became a drug in search of a (human) disease."

Some years ago GS-441524 and Remdesivir were both tested against FIP a 95% fatal cat coronavirus.

Gilead was involved in these University of California animal tests providing the 25+ different drugs initially screened for use in the trials and credited in the published research.

The trials showed both remdesivir and GS-441524 were effective against FIP however GS-441524 was preferred and cured 100% of the coronavirus infected cats in the university tests. Later field tests on pet cats confirmed GS-441524s effectiveness

Strangely Gilead has refused to allow anyone to make or legally use GS-441524 on cats (or any animals or humans) despite repeated requests related to cats

Thus long before Covid-19 cat owners were forced to buy GS-441524 on the black market to treat their cats and Gilead did nothing nor provided any explaination

Critics say Gilead blocks GS-441524 as it is easier and cheaper to make and so will compete against Remdesivir meaning Gilead will make less money

Following Gileads and the FDAs focus on remdesivir and their failure to enter into meaningful discussions or research on GS-441524, an open letter was written to the FDA and Gilead by a citizens advocacy group asking

why GS-441524 was not being studied as a Covid-19 treatment and

that the FDA and others be encouraged to do research or

to explain why it was not scientifically and medically possible to do so.

The citizens group writing the letter has formally raised medical and other matters over many years, is non political and has been critical of both the Trump administration and the FDA and their response to covid-19 and other citizens rights matters. For example they separately launched legal action against the FDA over what is said to be an unsafe medical device that the FDA failed to withdraw.

The FDA has just responded to the GS-441524 coronavirus research letter saying that they have now

“reviewed the literature and agree that this compound merits further exploration,”

View: https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1297572580853915648


The questions the seem important are

why has it taken so long to start this work,

why did it take a citizens group not doctors or researchers or health officials to get this to happen and

will others also now be encouraged to also do research or will it remain a limited work within the FDA

will Gilead do all it can to help serious researchers resolve if GS-441524 is more effective than remdesivir

does the FDA have a financial interest in remdesivir which is why it favors that drug

Gilead has yet to indicate that it will allow others outside the FDA to view any data it or the FDA holds or encourage third party research.

Research indicates that GS-441524 is less toxic than remdesivir so can be given in higher doses and is much easier to make than remdesivir plus has many other benefits over remdesivir.

Texas University researchers have responded to questions about why GC-441524 is probably superior - see statnews article already linked from May 2020 and the following q&a posted


A private Dr highlighted GS-441524 in Feb 2020 in a Tampa Fl news article.

According to journalists and others Gilead has not responded to requests to clarify its position on allowing GS-441524 for the treatment for cats and seems unwilling to provide any meaningful response to requests for clarification on a range of matters about GS-441524 including encouraging meaningful covid-19 research. Gileads responses have focused on stressing remdesivir benefits or passing comments about any researching of GS-441524

Gilead and the FDA jointly developed the drug Remdesivir however Gilead registered the patent without including any FDA rights though later published research papers clearly list the many government scientists involved


GS-441524 was also developed and patented with other parties and is a very similar drug to remdesivir. The Gilead patent life for Remdesivir is 7+ years longer than the GS-441524 patent and for other reasons the GS-441524 patent may be less profitable for Gilead.

Gilead has prior history of trying to exclude the FDA from participating in patent royalities the FDA contributed to developing.


In a letter to leadership of Gilead Sciences, Inc., the National Institutes of Health, the Food and Drug Administration, and the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority, Public Citizen and two scientists specializing in cancer drug development offer a detailed summary of scientific evidence suggesting that the experimental antiviral drug GS-441524 may be a better drug than the closely-related drug remdesivir to treat COVID-19. The letter asks Gilead and the federal agencies either to work collaboratively to promptly pursue the development of GS-441524 as a treatment for COVID-19 or to publicly explain and provide evidence as to why doing so is not scientifically or medically feasible.

The links to the open letter to Gilead and the FDA and other articles and info are below


Open letter to Gilead and FDA



FDA response

View: https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1297572580853915648


“reviewed the literature and agree that this compound merits further exploration,”

Michael Abrams Phd , health researcher at Public Citizen and lead author of the letter to the FDA states “Such further study of the drug is long overdue, especially given the evidence that GS-441524 may be cheaper and easier to manufacture and more amenable to administration in inhaled or oral forms than remdesivir.”

“We hope that Gilead will respond similarly and commit to working collaboratively with the NIH to study the potential of GS-441524, even if it means the company may reap lower profits than expected from the marketing of remdesivir,” Abrams added.



Research on GS-441524


Lab tests have suggested GS-441524 is active against SARS-CoV-2, and it is apparently similar or superior to the effects of remdesivir at levels that do not cause much toxicity, according to the Anderson researchers, who want to run their own tests. They also maintain the compound is more easily synthesized than remdesivir, so it should be easier to create oral versions and make higher doses.


The nucleoside analog GS-441524 strongly inhibits feline infectious peritonitis (FIP) virus in tissue culture and experimental cat infection studies

10 cats were infected with FIP and then treated with GS-441524. All 10 cats recovered.

Department of Pathology, Microbiology, and Immunology, School of Veterinary Medicine, University of California, Davis, CA, USA

Gilead Sciences, Foster City, CA, USA

Accepted 14 April 2018



Current knowledge about the antivirals remdesivir (GS-5734) and GS-441524 as therapeutic options for coronaviruses
Susan Amirian
Julie K.Levy

Public Health & Healthcare Program, Texas Policy Lab, School of Social Sciences, Rice University, Houston, TX, USA

Maddie's Shelter Medicine Program, College of Veterinary Medicine, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL, USA

Accepted 24 March 2020,



The Atlantic

The background to the long term Cat research GS-441524 and the treatment people are using to cure cats of a deadly coronavirus that kills around 95% of infected cats

Around 5 years ago Gilead sent University researchers 25 or 30 molecules, drawn from the large library of drug candidates that pharmaceutical companies typically maintain.

Two of the molecules worked marvelously in cat cells infected with the FIP virus: GS-441524 and GS-5734, the latter of which is now better known as remdesivir.

After Ebola trials found little benefit, remdesivir became a drug in search of a (human) disease.

Both molecules were effective, so Pedersen decided to pursue the simpler one, GS-441524. He then infected 10 cats with FIP and dosed them with GS-441524. All 10 cats recovered.

“We almost fell out of our chairs,” says Weigner.

in a follow-up field trial of 31 pets with naturally acquired FIP, 25 ultimately made it—an unheard-of recovery rate.

Despite the success, Gilead refused to license GS-441524 for use in cats.

While Pedersen was testing GS-441524 in cats, a different virus—a human virus—was raging halfway around the world in West Africa: Ebola. The virus that causes Ebola is not a coronavirus, but remdesivir is unusually broad-acting for an antiviral, and early results against Ebola were promising. So promising, in fact, that the company was eyeing FDA approval of remdesivir in humans.

According to Pedersen, Gilead worried that the cat research could impede the approval process for remdesivir. Because GS-441524 and remdesivir are so similar, any adverse effects uncovered in cats might have to be reported and investigated to guarantee remdesivir’s safety in humans.

Gilead’s caution about generating unnecessary cat data is standard industry practice. “One of the rules in drug development is never perform a test you don’t have to, if the results could be problematic,” says Richard Sachleben, a retired pharma-industry researcher.

(Gilead declined to comment for this story.)




Pharmalot
The U.S. government contributed research to a Gilead remdesivir patent — but didn’t get credit
By Ed Silverman @Pharmalot
May 8, 2020

September 2015 in which Gilead sought a U.S. patent for a using the compound for any number of coronavirus infections. Although the code Gilead assigned to the compound – GS-5734 – does not appear in the body of the application, experts who have reviewed the chemical structure say the compound is remdesivir.

One month later, some of the same Gilead employees whose names appeared on the patent application were listed as co-authors on a Nature research paper – along with numerous government scientists – showing remdesivir, specifically, held promise in fighting Ebola and other coronaviruses. The paper also noted testing was conducted at high-risk security labs run by the federal government.

The role played by the federal government in developing remdesivir to combat coronaviruses has, in fact, involved various grants to universities, as well as contributions from government personnel at such agencies as the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases, according to Knowledge Ecology International, an advocacy group that first disclosed these connections.

But while it remains unclear the extent to which federal funds contributed to the R&D, the patent is of particular interest because it is tangible evidence that government work yielded something of potential financial value to the company. Yet government employees are not listed as inventors, which one expert suggested should be corrected, especially in an era when federally financed research might be leveraged to collect royalties or, arguably, lower the price of medicines.

“In this case, all of these scientists were really working together very intimately on research that led to the molecule,” said Arti Rai, a Duke University law professor who specializes in intellectual property and a former U.S. Patent and Trademark Office official, who is researching remdesivir patents and the role played by the federal government.

“Gilead actually had a huge number of patents on the molecules, but had to do a tremendous amount of work to figure out which variations of the various molecules would work against the biological models the government had. This patent illustrates the essence of why collaboration between the public and private sectors is important, not just in terms of money, such as grants, but resources.”

“What really matters is how much money the government has put into research, but if their names were on there, it would help to make the case there was a lot of in-kind contribution from the government,” she explained. “Right now, if Gilead tried to assert rights (in response to a patent challenge), there would be no way to know there was some government right to a license to the patent.”

Generally, one must play connect the dots to find government assistance. For instance, the National Institutes of Health gave grants to several universities whose researchers worked with Gilead scientists. Their efforts appeared in a 2018 paper in the American Society for Microbiology, which found remdesivir can combat coronaviruses, noted Tahir Amin, who heads the Initiative for Medicines, Access, and Knowledge, an advocacy group that challenged various Gilead patents on hepatitis C medicines.

We asked Gilead, which several months ago sought to add claims to the patent, for comment and will update you accordingly.

Numerous consumer advocates, academics, and lawmakers have argued that prescription drugs invented with taxpayer dollars should be affordable to Americans. Public Citizen estimated that U.S. taxpayers contributed $70.5 million to remdesivir R&D overall.

“Since we’re paying for the research, we shouldn’t expect to be at disadvantage,” said Jamie Love of Knowledge Ecology International. “The argument that you have to have a high price because a company made big investments is harder to justify when there was a large public financing role in the R&D. A high company may say a high price is necessary, but the rationale falls apart when we’re paying for the R&D.”

Gilead has often been at the center of such debates. As noted previously, the drug maker and the federal government filed dueling lawsuits over patents that formed the basis of a best-selling HIV prevention pill called Truvada. The government claims Gilead should pay royalties on its patents, which stemmed, in part, from taxpayer funding, while the company has argued the government patents are invalid.


Feb 2020 news article on GS-441524
By Dr. Joette Giovinco

Dr. Joette Giovinco wrote a press article highlighting GS-441524 in Feb 2020 as a promising Covid-19 treatment




Remdesivir is a promising antiviral drug and works by inhibiting the activity of RNA dependent RNA polymerase (RdRp).

GS-441524 is a feline infectious peritonitis virus (FIPV) inhibitor and a predominant metabolite of Remdesivir that is superior to Remdesivir against COVID-19.

First GS-441524 shows comparable efficacy in cell-based models of primary human lung and cat cells infected with the coronavirus. GS-441524 could strongly inhibit feline infectious peritonitis virus (FIPV), with an EC50of 0.78 μM.

Recent research in coronavirus-infected nonhuman primates demonstrated problems with remdesivir that inadvertently showed the antiviral effectiveness of GS-441524. In multiple studies testing remdesivir in coronavirus-infected mice or rhesus macaques, it was rapidly converted to GS-441524 in the bloodstream..... injection of remdesivir in NHP results in GS-441524 being present in serum at concentrations 1000-fold higher than remdesivir throughout a 7-day treatment course (Figure 3b).

Last but not the least, GS-441524 is capable of treating cats suffering from feline infectious peritonitis (FIP) with a 96% cure rate. Importantly, coupled with the robust antiviral activity of GS-441524 against FIP, these data compel further investigations into the therapeutic and prophylactic utility of GS-441524 against SARS-CoV-2.

All in all, GS-441524, a FIPV inhibitor, is a predominant metabolite of Remdesivir and superior to Remdesivir against COVID-19.







GILEAD owns patent rights to GS-441524 (2009) and Remdesivir (2017); The 2009 patent of GS-441524 may be invalid due to prior art: as we have seen in the GILEAD vs MERK trial (which Merk initially won), there is a large amount of prior art in the nucleoside space that may invalidate the GS-441524 patent.


Covid-19 treatnent research drug GC376

A final thought - great research is being done on Covid-19 some of it is below on another drug also tested on cats with FIP. However this drug GC376 was much less successful than GS-441524

The researchers of GC376 are clearly very good and professional

However how is it Covid-19 treatment research can be done on GC376 with cat coronavirus FIP treatment effectiveness being cited as one of the reasons for rapid research, and yet this not happen on GS-441524 when its almost 100% effective against the cat coronavirus FIP and worked well against other coronaviruses plus GS-441524 is potentially better than remdesivir ?

antiviral GC376 out of Kansas State University had previously been tested but only seven out of 20 cats had gone into remission. Those results seemed impressive at the time, but GS-441524 appeared to be even better

"Relapses no longer responsive to treatment occurred in 13 of these 19 cats within 1-7 weeks of initial or repeat treatment(s). Severe neurologic disease occurred in 8/13 cats that failed treatment and five cats had recurrences of abdominal lesions. At the time of writing, seven cats were in disease remission."


Research on GC376


Published: 27 August 2020

Feline coronavirus drug GC376 inhibits the main protease of SARS-CoV-2 and blocks virus replication


GC376 has been used to successfully treat FIP in cats as its breakdown product, GC373, effectively inhibits the Mpro of FCoV. Analogs of these drugs also inhibited the MERS CoV Mpro and blocked viral replication in cells at an EC50 of 0.5 μM14. Our studies show GC376 and GC373 to be effective inhibitors of SARS-CoV-2 Mpro, in agreement with previous studies showing GC373 and GC376 possess broad specificity against the Mpro of coronaviruses and calciviruses (Supplementary Table 2)10,13,14,22. Clearly, these drugs need to be advanced quickly into human trials for COVID-19. SARS-CoV-2 is the cause of COVID-19 and is a virus with a significant mutation rate23. Also, in some patients the virus has persisted longer than 2 months with some possibility of re-infection24. Vaccines are critically important, but still likely a year or more away as this virus may present vaccine challenges.

There are many clinical trials testing drugs re-purposed from their original indications. Remdesivir, a polymerase inhibitor developed as a treatment for Ebola virus25 had initially been used in compassion cases, and is now FDA approved for emergency use in patients with COVID-19......

How was a long known treatment found and blocked for a new condition?
 

adam

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How was a long known treatment found and blocked for a new condition?

Critics say Gilead has blocked the use of or studies on its drug GS-441524 on Covid-19 because Gilead will make less money despite evidence that GS-441524 will be as or more effective than Gileads other drug remdesivir

Both remdesivir (GS-5734) and GS-441524 are owned in full or part by Gilead and are almost identical chemically.

GS-441524 is much simpler to make than remdesivir so much cheaper to produce and has extensively used on cats to cure about 96% of cats with a fatal cat coronavirus - FIP

GS-441524 is the "predominant metabolite of Remdesivir"

GS-441524 was successful in prior lab studies against coronaviruses SARS, MERS and FIP a near 100% fatal cat coronavirus that GS-441524 cures

Some years ago Gilead and the University of California did tests with GS-441524 on cats with FIP both in lab settings and later on pet cats with the 100% fatal cat coronavirus FIP - GS-441524 was an almost 100% successful cure

Gilead refused to allow GS-441524 to be manufactured to treat cats, so it has for many years been made without permission and used by cat owners and cat charities to successfully and rapidly treat cats who are in critical and fatal condition

The patent life for GS-441524 is much shorter than remdesivir and could be challanged or need to be shared and so Gilead will make less money.

Gilead has a history of seeking to exclude the FDA for sharing patents it has a right to due to the FDA facilities, researchers and indirect financial support - with the need for patent litigation between the FDA and Gilead being publically discussed over previous drugs

Gilead failed to included the FDA in its remdesivir patent filings despite published research and papers crediting FDA researchers and facilities for much of the work and development

As early as Feb 2020 Drs were pointing out GS-441524 could be a very effective covid-19 treatment


Further research shows GS-441524 is the effective compound in remdesivir

High Potency Remdesivir studies show GS-441524 is the effective compound that is left in lungs to treat covid-19

Robert O. Williams III, study co-author said “And importantly, new data from the study regarding the formulation of remdesivir with leucine suggest that the TFF formulation can significantly prolong the duration of the remdesivir nucleoside analog GS-441524 in the lung, providing a important therapeutic benefit for lung delivery.”

 
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In May 2020 Cancer researchers from the University of Texas set out in some detail why Gileads drug GS-441524 was superior to Gileads Remdesivir as a Coronavirus treatment. This was based both on animals trials and previous research on GS-441524. In some animals trials GS-441524 was compared directly with Remdesivir, as an anti coronavirus treatment, with GS-441524 becoming the preferred treatment.

Gilead developed Remdesivir with the FDA, however it is much more complicated and expensive to make than GS-441524 and could be less effective but for numerous reasons Gilead will make more money from Remdesivir and the FDA may also has a financial interest in remdesivir.

Critics say a long known promising Covid-19 treatment GS-441524 has not been studied and that it was delibrately blocked, for profit reasons, from Covid-19 researchers, having proper access to all the information on it.

Prior lab studies have shown that GS-441524 is effective against coronaviruses SARS, MERS and FIP a near 100% fatal cat coronavirus that GS-441524 had a near 100% cure rate for.

Gileads' responses have not addressed the points raised nor whether Gilead is promoting remdesivir because of its longer patent or why Gilead blocked and/or also had not encouraged or helped anyone researching the medical effectiveness of GS-441524 to resolve matters.

Gilead has for a some years also refused to explain why it has not allowed the manufacture or licensing of GS-441524 for use in cats after successful animal trials cured cats of a fatal coronavirus disease


A journalist writing in The Atlantic said "After Ebola trials in previous years found little benefit, remdesivir became a drug in search of a (human) disease."

Some years ago GS-441524 and Remdesivir were both tested against FIP a 95% fatal cat coronavirus.

Gilead was involved in these University of California animal tests providing the 25+ different drugs initially screened for use in the trials and credited in the published research.

The trials showed both remdesivir and GS-441524 were effective against FIP however GS-441524 was preferred and cured 100% of the coronavirus infected cats in the university tests. Later field tests on pet cats confirmed GS-441524s effectiveness

Strangely Gilead has refused to allow anyone to make or legally use GS-441524 on cats (or any animals or humans) despite repeated requests related to cats

Thus long before Covid-19 cat owners were forced to buy GS-441524 on the black market to treat their cats and Gilead did nothing nor provided any explaination

Critics say Gilead blocks GS-441524 as it is easier and cheaper to make and so will compete against Remdesivir meaning Gilead will make less money

Following Gileads and the FDAs focus on remdesivir and their failure to enter into meaningful discussions or research on GS-441524, an open letter was written to the FDA and Gilead by a citizens advocacy group asking

why GS-441524 was not being studied as a Covid-19 treatment and

that the FDA and others be encouraged to do research or

to explain why it was not scientifically and medically possible to do so.

The citizens group writing the letter has formally raised medical and other matters over many years, is non political and has been critical of both the Trump administration and the FDA and their response to covid-19 and other citizens rights matters. For example they separately launched legal action against the FDA over what is said to be an unsafe medical device that the FDA failed to withdraw.

The FDA has just responded to the GS-441524 coronavirus research letter saying that they have now

“reviewed the literature and agree that this compound merits further exploration,”

View: https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1297572580853915648


The questions the seem important are

why has it taken so long to start this work,

why did it take a citizens group not doctors or researchers or health officials to get this to happen and

will others also now be encouraged to also do research or will it remain a limited work within the FDA

will Gilead do all it can to help serious researchers resolve if GS-441524 is more effective than remdesivir

does the FDA have a financial interest in remdesivir which is why it favors that drug

Gilead has yet to indicate that it will allow others outside the FDA to view any data it or the FDA holds or encourage third party research.

Research indicates that GS-441524 is less toxic than remdesivir so can be given in higher doses and is much easier to make than remdesivir plus has many other benefits over remdesivir.

Texas University researchers have responded to questions about why GC-441524 is probably superior - see statnews article already linked from May 2020 and the following q&a posted


A private Dr highlighted GS-441524 in Feb 2020 in a Tampa Fl news article.

According to journalists and others Gilead has not responded to requests to clarify its position on allowing GS-441524 for the treatment for cats and seems unwilling to provide any meaningful response to requests for clarification on a range of matters about GS-441524 including encouraging meaningful covid-19 research. Gileads responses have focused on stressing remdesivir benefits or passing comments about any researching of GS-441524

Gilead and the FDA jointly developed the drug Remdesivir however Gilead registered the patent without including any FDA rights though later published research papers clearly list the many government scientists involved


GS-441524 was also developed and patented with other parties and is a very similar drug to remdesivir. The Gilead patent life for Remdesivir is 7+ years longer than the GS-441524 patent and for other reasons the GS-441524 patent may be less profitable for Gilead.

Gilead has prior history of trying to exclude the FDA from participating in patent royalities the FDA contributed to developing.


In a letter to leadership of Gilead Sciences, Inc., the National Institutes of Health, the Food and Drug Administration, and the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority, Public Citizen and two scientists specializing in cancer drug development offer a detailed summary of scientific evidence suggesting that the experimental antiviral drug GS-441524 may be a better drug than the closely-related drug remdesivir to treat COVID-19. The letter asks Gilead and the federal agencies either to work collaboratively to promptly pursue the development of GS-441524 as a treatment for COVID-19 or to publicly explain and provide evidence as to why doing so is not scientifically or medically feasible.

The links to the open letter to Gilead and the FDA and other articles and info are below


Open letter to Gilead and FDA



FDA response

View: https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1297572580853915648


“reviewed the literature and agree that this compound merits further exploration,”

Michael Abrams Phd , health researcher at Public Citizen and lead author of the letter to the FDA states “Such further study of the drug is long overdue, especially given the evidence that GS-441524 may be cheaper and easier to manufacture and more amenable to administration in inhaled or oral forms than remdesivir.”

“We hope that Gilead will respond similarly and commit to working collaboratively with the NIH to study the potential of GS-441524, even if it means the company may reap lower profits than expected from the marketing of remdesivir,” Abrams added.



Research on GS-441524


Lab tests have suggested GS-441524 is active against SARS-CoV-2, and it is apparently similar or superior to the effects of remdesivir at levels that do not cause much toxicity, according to the Anderson researchers, who want to run their own tests. They also maintain the compound is more easily synthesized than remdesivir, so it should be easier to create oral versions and make higher doses.


The nucleoside analog GS-441524 strongly inhibits feline infectious peritonitis (FIP) virus in tissue culture and experimental cat infection studies

10 cats were infected with FIP and then treated with GS-441524. All 10 cats recovered.

Department of Pathology, Microbiology, and Immunology, School of Veterinary Medicine, University of California, Davis, CA, USA

Gilead Sciences, Foster City, CA, USA

Accepted 14 April 2018



Current knowledge about the antivirals remdesivir (GS-5734) and GS-441524 as therapeutic options for coronaviruses
Susan Amirian
Julie K.Levy

Public Health & Healthcare Program, Texas Policy Lab, School of Social Sciences, Rice University, Houston, TX, USA

Maddie's Shelter Medicine Program, College of Veterinary Medicine, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL, USA

Accepted 24 March 2020,



The Atlantic

The background to the long term Cat research GS-441524 and the treatment people are using to cure cats of a deadly coronavirus that kills around 95% of infected cats

Around 5 years ago Gilead sent University researchers 25 or 30 molecules, drawn from the large library of drug candidates that pharmaceutical companies typically maintain.

Two of the molecules worked marvelously in cat cells infected with the FIP virus: GS-441524 and GS-5734, the latter of which is now better known as remdesivir.

After Ebola trials found little benefit, remdesivir became a drug in search of a (human) disease.

Both molecules were effective, so Pedersen decided to pursue the simpler one, GS-441524. He then infected 10 cats with FIP and dosed them with GS-441524. All 10 cats recovered.

“We almost fell out of our chairs,” says Weigner.

in a follow-up field trial of 31 pets with naturally acquired FIP, 25 ultimately made it—an unheard-of recovery rate.

Despite the success, Gilead refused to license GS-441524 for use in cats.

While Pedersen was testing GS-441524 in cats, a different virus—a human virus—was raging halfway around the world in West Africa: Ebola. The virus that causes Ebola is not a coronavirus, but remdesivir is unusually broad-acting for an antiviral, and early results against Ebola were promising. So promising, in fact, that the company was eyeing FDA approval of remdesivir in humans.

According to Pedersen, Gilead worried that the cat research could impede the approval process for remdesivir. Because GS-441524 and remdesivir are so similar, any adverse effects uncovered in cats might have to be reported and investigated to guarantee remdesivir’s safety in humans.

Gilead’s caution about generating unnecessary cat data is standard industry practice. “One of the rules in drug development is never perform a test you don’t have to, if the results could be problematic,” says Richard Sachleben, a retired pharma-industry researcher.

(Gilead declined to comment for this story.)




Pharmalot
The U.S. government contributed research to a Gilead remdesivir patent — but didn’t get credit
By Ed Silverman @Pharmalot
May 8, 2020

September 2015 in which Gilead sought a U.S. patent for a using the compound for any number of coronavirus infections. Although the code Gilead assigned to the compound – GS-5734 – does not appear in the body of the application, experts who have reviewed the chemical structure say the compound is remdesivir.

One month later, some of the same Gilead employees whose names appeared on the patent application were listed as co-authors on a Nature research paper – along with numerous government scientists – showing remdesivir, specifically, held promise in fighting Ebola and other coronaviruses. The paper also noted testing was conducted at high-risk security labs run by the federal government.

The role played by the federal government in developing remdesivir to combat coronaviruses has, in fact, involved various grants to universities, as well as contributions from government personnel at such agencies as the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases, according to Knowledge Ecology International, an advocacy group that first disclosed these connections.

But while it remains unclear the extent to which federal funds contributed to the R&D, the patent is of particular interest because it is tangible evidence that government work yielded something of potential financial value to the company. Yet government employees are not listed as inventors, which one expert suggested should be corrected, especially in an era when federally financed research might be leveraged to collect royalties or, arguably, lower the price of medicines.

“In this case, all of these scientists were really working together very intimately on research that led to the molecule,” said Arti Rai, a Duke University law professor who specializes in intellectual property and a former U.S. Patent and Trademark Office official, who is researching remdesivir patents and the role played by the federal government.

“Gilead actually had a huge number of patents on the molecules, but had to do a tremendous amount of work to figure out which variations of the various molecules would work against the biological models the government had. This patent illustrates the essence of why collaboration between the public and private sectors is important, not just in terms of money, such as grants, but resources.”

“What really matters is how much money the government has put into research, but if their names were on there, it would help to make the case there was a lot of in-kind contribution from the government,” she explained. “Right now, if Gilead tried to assert rights (in response to a patent challenge), there would be no way to know there was some government right to a license to the patent.”

Generally, one must play connect the dots to find government assistance. For instance, the National Institutes of Health gave grants to several universities whose researchers worked with Gilead scientists. Their efforts appeared in a 2018 paper in the American Society for Microbiology, which found remdesivir can combat coronaviruses, noted Tahir Amin, who heads the Initiative for Medicines, Access, and Knowledge, an advocacy group that challenged various Gilead patents on hepatitis C medicines.

We asked Gilead, which several months ago sought to add claims to the patent, for comment and will update you accordingly.

Numerous consumer advocates, academics, and lawmakers have argued that prescription drugs invented with taxpayer dollars should be affordable to Americans. Public Citizen estimated that U.S. taxpayers contributed $70.5 million to remdesivir R&D overall.

“Since we’re paying for the research, we shouldn’t expect to be at disadvantage,” said Jamie Love of Knowledge Ecology International. “The argument that you have to have a high price because a company made big investments is harder to justify when there was a large public financing role in the R&D. A high company may say a high price is necessary, but the rationale falls apart when we’re paying for the R&D.”

Gilead has often been at the center of such debates. As noted previously, the drug maker and the federal government filed dueling lawsuits over patents that formed the basis of a best-selling HIV prevention pill called Truvada. The government claims Gilead should pay royalties on its patents, which stemmed, in part, from taxpayer funding, while the company has argued the government patents are invalid.


Feb 2020 news article on GS-441524
By Dr. Joette Giovinco

Dr. Joette Giovinco wrote a press article highlighting GS-441524 in Feb 2020 as a promising Covid-19 treatment




Remdesivir is a promising antiviral drug and works by inhibiting the activity of RNA dependent RNA polymerase (RdRp).

GS-441524 is a feline infectious peritonitis virus (FIPV) inhibitor and a predominant metabolite of Remdesivir that is superior to Remdesivir against COVID-19.

First GS-441524 shows comparable efficacy in cell-based models of primary human lung and cat cells infected with the coronavirus. GS-441524 could strongly inhibit feline infectious peritonitis virus (FIPV), with an EC50of 0.78 μM.

Recent research in coronavirus-infected nonhuman primates demonstrated problems with remdesivir that inadvertently showed the antiviral effectiveness of GS-441524. In multiple studies testing remdesivir in coronavirus-infected mice or rhesus macaques, it was rapidly converted to GS-441524 in the bloodstream..... injection of remdesivir in NHP results in GS-441524 being present in serum at concentrations 1000-fold higher than remdesivir throughout a 7-day treatment course (Figure 3b).

Last but not the least, GS-441524 is capable of treating cats suffering from feline infectious peritonitis (FIP) with a 96% cure rate. Importantly, coupled with the robust antiviral activity of GS-441524 against FIP, these data compel further investigations into the therapeutic and prophylactic utility of GS-441524 against SARS-CoV-2.

All in all, GS-441524, a FIPV inhibitor, is a predominant metabolite of Remdesivir and superior to Remdesivir against COVID-19.







GILEAD owns patent rights to GS-441524 (2009) and Remdesivir (2017); The 2009 patent of GS-441524 may be invalid due to prior art: as we have seen in the GILEAD vs MERK trial (which Merk initially won), there is a large amount of prior art in the nucleoside space that may invalidate the GS-441524 patent.


Covid-19 treatnent research drug GC376

A final thought - great research is being done on Covid-19 some of it is below on another drug also tested on cats with FIP. However this drug GC376 was much less successful than GS-441524

The researchers of GC376 are clearly very good and professional

However how is it Covid-19 treatment research can be done on GC376 with cat coronavirus FIP treatment effectiveness being cited as one of the reasons for rapid research, and yet this not happen on GS-441524 when its almost 100% effective against the cat coronavirus FIP and worked well against other coronaviruses plus GS-441524 is potentially better than remdesivir ?

antiviral GC376 out of Kansas State University had previously been tested but only seven out of 20 cats had gone into remission. Those results seemed impressive at the time, but GS-441524 appeared to be even better

"Relapses no longer responsive to treatment occurred in 13 of these 19 cats within 1-7 weeks of initial or repeat treatment(s). Severe neurologic disease occurred in 8/13 cats that failed treatment and five cats had recurrences of abdominal lesions. At the time of writing, seven cats were in disease remission."


Research on GC376


Published: 27 August 2020

Feline coronavirus drug GC376 inhibits the main protease of SARS-CoV-2 and blocks virus replication


GC376 has been used to successfully treat FIP in cats as its breakdown product, GC373, effectively inhibits the Mpro of FCoV. Analogs of these drugs also inhibited the MERS CoV Mpro and blocked viral replication in cells at an EC50 of 0.5 μM14. Our studies show GC376 and GC373 to be effective inhibitors of SARS-CoV-2 Mpro, in agreement with previous studies showing GC373 and GC376 possess broad specificity against the Mpro of coronaviruses and calciviruses (Supplementary Table 2)10,13,14,22. Clearly, these drugs need to be advanced quickly into human trials for COVID-19. SARS-CoV-2 is the cause of COVID-19 and is a virus with a significant mutation rate23. Also, in some patients the virus has persisted longer than 2 months with some possibility of re-infection24. Vaccines are critically important, but still likely a year or more away as this virus may present vaccine challenges.

There are many clinical trials testing drugs re-purposed from their original indications. Remdesivir, a polymerase inhibitor developed as a treatment for Ebola virus25 had initially been used in compassion cases, and is now FDA approved for emergency use in patients with COVID-19......


High Potency Remdesivir and normal remdesivir are effectively just producing another cheaper Gilead drug GS-441524

Studies have shown GS-441524 is the effective compound that remdesivir (GS-5734) is converted into and GS-441524 is left in lungs to treat Covid-19 infection. So why not use GS-441524 rather than remdesivir.

Robert O. Williams III, study co-author said “And importantly, new data from the study regarding the formulation of remdesivir with leucine suggest that the TFF formulation can significantly prolong the duration of the remdesivir nucleoside analog GS-441524 in the lung, providing a important therapeutic benefit for lung delivery.”


There has been no real news about what research the FDA has started doing on GS-441524 despite the FDA belatedly admitting in August they had now

“reviewed the literature and agree that this compound (GS-441524) merits further exploration,”

Gilead has refused to research GS-441524 which has a shorter patent than remdedivir, despite it being almost identical to remdesivir and the main metabolite of remdesivir.


The treatment study about high potency remdesivir is different to the work on GS-441524 but supports the questions raised

It looks like different researchers at the University of Texas are working on remdesivir and GS-441524. It is unclear if this will cause a conflict of interest or not or if any co-ordination is taking place

Further research indicates a highly effective fatal cat coronavirus treatment drug GS-441524 (also owned by Gilead) is a direct competitor, more effective and a cheaper treatment against Covid-19 than Gilead's remdesivir (GS-5734) treatment

For full links to published studies, news and the FDA response agreeing Covid-19 treatment research should be done on GS-441524 see link at start of this response or the start of this thread.

The FDA responded in August to an open letter to Gilead and the FDA from a well respected citizens rights group and University of Texas researchers asking why GS-441524 was not being researched as a Covid-19 treatment despite extensive long established research studies and animal treatment showing its high effectiveness against various coronaviruses and being simpler and almost identictical to remdesivir

This includes widespread use of GS-441524 over some years with a near 100% success rate as a treatment for a common and fatal cat coronavirus, and successful previous use against other coronaviruses such as SARS and MERS

Gilead failed to respond to the letter or the Texas researchers or materially address their position on GS-441524

Neither the FDA or Gilead have explained why no research on GS-441524 was carried out or even considered to date or promoted despite researchers and others setting out their findings or serious questions / comments since around Feb 2020 and certainly by May 2020

With the FDA now confirming that the long standing research on GS-441524 going back many years had merit and would now be looked into questions should be asked about the FDAs duties and why Gilead has acted against the public interest in blocking research on GS-441524 over many years and did Gilead have the right to do so ? Also has Gilead claimed rights over a patent for GS-441524 that it had only questionable rights to ?
 
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In May 2020 Cancer researchers from the University of Texas set out in some detail why Gileads drug GS-441524 was superior to Gileads Remdesivir as a Coronavirus treatment. This was based both on animals trials and previous research on GS-441524. In some animals trials GS-441524 was compared directly with Remdesivir, as an anti coronavirus treatment, with GS-441524 becoming the preferred treatment.

Gilead developed Remdesivir with the FDA, however it is much more complicated and expensive to make than GS-441524 and could be less effective but for numerous reasons Gilead will make more money from Remdesivir and the FDA may also has a financial interest in remdesivir.

Critics say a long known promising Covid-19 treatment GS-441524 has not been studied and that it was delibrately blocked, for profit reasons, from Covid-19 researchers, having proper access to all the information on it.

Prior lab studies have shown that GS-441524 is effective against coronaviruses SARS, MERS and FIP a near 100% fatal cat coronavirus that GS-441524 had a near 100% cure rate for.

Gileads' responses have not addressed the points raised nor whether Gilead is promoting remdesivir because of its longer patent or why Gilead blocked and/or also had not encouraged or helped anyone researching the medical effectiveness of GS-441524 to resolve matters.

Gilead has for a some years also refused to explain why it has not allowed the manufacture or licensing of GS-441524 for use in cats after successful animal trials cured cats of a fatal coronavirus disease


A journalist writing in The Atlantic said "After Ebola trials in previous years found little benefit, remdesivir became a drug in search of a (human) disease."

Some years ago GS-441524 and Remdesivir were both tested against FIP a 95% fatal cat coronavirus.

Gilead was involved in these University of California animal tests providing the 25+ different drugs initially screened for use in the trials and credited in the published research.

The trials showed both remdesivir and GS-441524 were effective against FIP however GS-441524 was preferred and cured 100% of the coronavirus infected cats in the university tests. Later field tests on pet cats confirmed GS-441524s effectiveness

Strangely Gilead has refused to allow anyone to make or legally use GS-441524 on cats (or any animals or humans) despite repeated requests related to cats

Thus long before Covid-19 cat owners were forced to buy GS-441524 on the black market to treat their cats and Gilead did nothing nor provided any explaination

Critics say Gilead blocks GS-441524 as it is easier and cheaper to make and so will compete against Remdesivir meaning Gilead will make less money

Following Gileads and the FDAs focus on remdesivir and their failure to enter into meaningful discussions or research on GS-441524, an open letter was written to the FDA and Gilead by a citizens advocacy group asking

why GS-441524 was not being studied as a Covid-19 treatment and

that the FDA and others be encouraged to do research or

to explain why it was not scientifically and medically possible to do so.

The citizens group writing the letter has formally raised medical and other matters over many years, is non political and has been critical of both the Trump administration and the FDA and their response to covid-19 and other citizens rights matters. For example they separately launched legal action against the FDA over what is said to be an unsafe medical device that the FDA failed to withdraw.

The FDA has just responded to the GS-441524 coronavirus research letter saying that they have now

“reviewed the literature and agree that this compound merits further exploration,”

View: https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1297572580853915648


The questions the seem important are

why has it taken so long to start this work,

why did it take a citizens group not doctors or researchers or health officials to get this to happen and

will others also now be encouraged to also do research or will it remain a limited work within the FDA

will Gilead do all it can to help serious researchers resolve if GS-441524 is more effective than remdesivir

does the FDA have a financial interest in remdesivir which is why it favors that drug

Gilead has yet to indicate that it will allow others outside the FDA to view any data it or the FDA holds or encourage third party research.

Research indicates that GS-441524 is less toxic than remdesivir so can be given in higher doses and is much easier to make than remdesivir plus has many other benefits over remdesivir.

Texas University researchers have responded to questions about why GC-441524 is probably superior - see statnews article already linked from May 2020 and the following q&a posted


A private Dr highlighted GS-441524 in Feb 2020 in a Tampa Fl news article.

According to journalists and others Gilead has not responded to requests to clarify its position on allowing GS-441524 for the treatment for cats and seems unwilling to provide any meaningful response to requests for clarification on a range of matters about GS-441524 including encouraging meaningful covid-19 research. Gileads responses have focused on stressing remdesivir benefits or passing comments about any researching of GS-441524

Gilead and the FDA jointly developed the drug Remdesivir however Gilead registered the patent without including any FDA rights though later published research papers clearly list the many government scientists involved


GS-441524 was also developed and patented with other parties and is a very similar drug to remdesivir. The Gilead patent life for Remdesivir is 7+ years longer than the GS-441524 patent and for other reasons the GS-441524 patent may be less profitable for Gilead.

Gilead has prior history of trying to exclude the FDA from participating in patent royalities the FDA contributed to developing.


In a letter to leadership of Gilead Sciences, Inc., the National Institutes of Health, the Food and Drug Administration, and the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority, Public Citizen and two scientists specializing in cancer drug development offer a detailed summary of scientific evidence suggesting that the experimental antiviral drug GS-441524 may be a better drug than the closely-related drug remdesivir to treat COVID-19. The letter asks Gilead and the federal agencies either to work collaboratively to promptly pursue the development of GS-441524 as a treatment for COVID-19 or to publicly explain and provide evidence as to why doing so is not scientifically or medically feasible.

The links to the open letter to Gilead and the FDA and other articles and info are below


Open letter to Gilead and FDA



FDA response

View: https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1297572580853915648


“reviewed the literature and agree that this compound merits further exploration,”

Michael Abrams Phd , health researcher at Public Citizen and lead author of the letter to the FDA states “Such further study of the drug is long overdue, especially given the evidence that GS-441524 may be cheaper and easier to manufacture and more amenable to administration in inhaled or oral forms than remdesivir.”

“We hope that Gilead will respond similarly and commit to working collaboratively with the NIH to study the potential of GS-441524, even if it means the company may reap lower profits than expected from the marketing of remdesivir,” Abrams added.



Research on GS-441524


Lab tests have suggested GS-441524 is active against SARS-CoV-2, and it is apparently similar or superior to the effects of remdesivir at levels that do not cause much toxicity, according to the Anderson researchers, who want to run their own tests. They also maintain the compound is more easily synthesized than remdesivir, so it should be easier to create oral versions and make higher doses.


The nucleoside analog GS-441524 strongly inhibits feline infectious peritonitis (FIP) virus in tissue culture and experimental cat infection studies

10 cats were infected with FIP and then treated with GS-441524. All 10 cats recovered.

Department of Pathology, Microbiology, and Immunology, School of Veterinary Medicine, University of California, Davis, CA, USA

Gilead Sciences, Foster City, CA, USA

Accepted 14 April 2018



Current knowledge about the antivirals remdesivir (GS-5734) and GS-441524 as therapeutic options for coronaviruses
Susan Amirian
Julie K.Levy

Public Health & Healthcare Program, Texas Policy Lab, School of Social Sciences, Rice University, Houston, TX, USA

Maddie's Shelter Medicine Program, College of Veterinary Medicine, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL, USA

Accepted 24 March 2020,



The Atlantic

The background to the long term Cat research GS-441524 and the treatment people are using to cure cats of a deadly coronavirus that kills around 95% of infected cats

Around 5 years ago Gilead sent University researchers 25 or 30 molecules, drawn from the large library of drug candidates that pharmaceutical companies typically maintain.

Two of the molecules worked marvelously in cat cells infected with the FIP virus: GS-441524 and GS-5734, the latter of which is now better known as remdesivir.

After Ebola trials found little benefit, remdesivir became a drug in search of a (human) disease.

Both molecules were effective, so Pedersen decided to pursue the simpler one, GS-441524. He then infected 10 cats with FIP and dosed them with GS-441524. All 10 cats recovered.

“We almost fell out of our chairs,” says Weigner.

in a follow-up field trial of 31 pets with naturally acquired FIP, 25 ultimately made it—an unheard-of recovery rate.

Despite the success, Gilead refused to license GS-441524 for use in cats.

While Pedersen was testing GS-441524 in cats, a different virus—a human virus—was raging halfway around the world in West Africa: Ebola. The virus that causes Ebola is not a coronavirus, but remdesivir is unusually broad-acting for an antiviral, and early results against Ebola were promising. So promising, in fact, that the company was eyeing FDA approval of remdesivir in humans.

According to Pedersen, Gilead worried that the cat research could impede the approval process for remdesivir. Because GS-441524 and remdesivir are so similar, any adverse effects uncovered in cats might have to be reported and investigated to guarantee remdesivir’s safety in humans.

Gilead’s caution about generating unnecessary cat data is standard industry practice. “One of the rules in drug development is never perform a test you don’t have to, if the results could be problematic,” says Richard Sachleben, a retired pharma-industry researcher.

(Gilead declined to comment for this story.)




Pharmalot
The U.S. government contributed research to a Gilead remdesivir patent — but didn’t get credit
By Ed Silverman @Pharmalot
May 8, 2020

September 2015 in which Gilead sought a U.S. patent for a using the compound for any number of coronavirus infections. Although the code Gilead assigned to the compound – GS-5734 – does not appear in the body of the application, experts who have reviewed the chemical structure say the compound is remdesivir.

One month later, some of the same Gilead employees whose names appeared on the patent application were listed as co-authors on a Nature research paper – along with numerous government scientists – showing remdesivir, specifically, held promise in fighting Ebola and other coronaviruses. The paper also noted testing was conducted at high-risk security labs run by the federal government.

The role played by the federal government in developing remdesivir to combat coronaviruses has, in fact, involved various grants to universities, as well as contributions from government personnel at such agencies as the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases, according to Knowledge Ecology International, an advocacy group that first disclosed these connections.

But while it remains unclear the extent to which federal funds contributed to the R&D, the patent is of particular interest because it is tangible evidence that government work yielded something of potential financial value to the company. Yet government employees are not listed as inventors, which one expert suggested should be corrected, especially in an era when federally financed research might be leveraged to collect royalties or, arguably, lower the price of medicines.

“In this case, all of these scientists were really working together very intimately on research that led to the molecule,” said Arti Rai, a Duke University law professor who specializes in intellectual property and a former U.S. Patent and Trademark Office official, who is researching remdesivir patents and the role played by the federal government.

“Gilead actually had a huge number of patents on the molecules, but had to do a tremendous amount of work to figure out which variations of the various molecules would work against the biological models the government had. This patent illustrates the essence of why collaboration between the public and private sectors is important, not just in terms of money, such as grants, but resources.”

“What really matters is how much money the government has put into research, but if their names were on there, it would help to make the case there was a lot of in-kind contribution from the government,” she explained. “Right now, if Gilead tried to assert rights (in response to a patent challenge), there would be no way to know there was some government right to a license to the patent.”

Generally, one must play connect the dots to find government assistance. For instance, the National Institutes of Health gave grants to several universities whose researchers worked with Gilead scientists. Their efforts appeared in a 2018 paper in the American Society for Microbiology, which found remdesivir can combat coronaviruses, noted Tahir Amin, who heads the Initiative for Medicines, Access, and Knowledge, an advocacy group that challenged various Gilead patents on hepatitis C medicines.

We asked Gilead, which several months ago sought to add claims to the patent, for comment and will update you accordingly.

Numerous consumer advocates, academics, and lawmakers have argued that prescription drugs invented with taxpayer dollars should be affordable to Americans. Public Citizen estimated that U.S. taxpayers contributed $70.5 million to remdesivir R&D overall.

“Since we’re paying for the research, we shouldn’t expect to be at disadvantage,” said Jamie Love of Knowledge Ecology International. “The argument that you have to have a high price because a company made big investments is harder to justify when there was a large public financing role in the R&D. A high company may say a high price is necessary, but the rationale falls apart when we’re paying for the R&D.”

Gilead has often been at the center of such debates. As noted previously, the drug maker and the federal government filed dueling lawsuits over patents that formed the basis of a best-selling HIV prevention pill called Truvada. The government claims Gilead should pay royalties on its patents, which stemmed, in part, from taxpayer funding, while the company has argued the government patents are invalid.


Feb 2020 news article on GS-441524
By Dr. Joette Giovinco

Dr. Joette Giovinco wrote a press article highlighting GS-441524 in Feb 2020 as a promising Covid-19 treatment




Remdesivir is a promising antiviral drug and works by inhibiting the activity of RNA dependent RNA polymerase (RdRp).

GS-441524 is a feline infectious peritonitis virus (FIPV) inhibitor and a predominant metabolite of Remdesivir that is superior to Remdesivir against COVID-19.

First GS-441524 shows comparable efficacy in cell-based models of primary human lung and cat cells infected with the coronavirus. GS-441524 could strongly inhibit feline infectious peritonitis virus (FIPV), with an EC50of 0.78 μM.

Recent research in coronavirus-infected nonhuman primates demonstrated problems with remdesivir that inadvertently showed the antiviral effectiveness of GS-441524. In multiple studies testing remdesivir in coronavirus-infected mice or rhesus macaques, it was rapidly converted to GS-441524 in the bloodstream..... injection of remdesivir in NHP results in GS-441524 being present in serum at concentrations 1000-fold higher than remdesivir throughout a 7-day treatment course (Figure 3b).

Last but not the least, GS-441524 is capable of treating cats suffering from feline infectious peritonitis (FIP) with a 96% cure rate. Importantly, coupled with the robust antiviral activity of GS-441524 against FIP, these data compel further investigations into the therapeutic and prophylactic utility of GS-441524 against SARS-CoV-2.

All in all, GS-441524, a FIPV inhibitor, is a predominant metabolite of Remdesivir and superior to Remdesivir against COVID-19.







GILEAD owns patent rights to GS-441524 (2009) and Remdesivir (2017); The 2009 patent of GS-441524 may be invalid due to prior art: as we have seen in the GILEAD vs MERK trial (which Merk initially won), there is a large amount of prior art in the nucleoside space that may invalidate the GS-441524 patent.


Covid-19 treatnent research drug GC376

A final thought - great research is being done on Covid-19 some of it is below on another drug also tested on cats with FIP. However this drug GC376 was much less successful than GS-441524

The researchers of GC376 are clearly very good and professional

However how is it Covid-19 treatment research can be done on GC376 with cat coronavirus FIP treatment effectiveness being cited as one of the reasons for rapid research, and yet this not happen on GS-441524 when its almost 100% effective against the cat coronavirus FIP and worked well against other coronaviruses plus GS-441524 is potentially better than remdesivir ?

antiviral GC376 out of Kansas State University had previously been tested but only seven out of 20 cats had gone into remission. Those results seemed impressive at the time, but GS-441524 appeared to be even better

"Relapses no longer responsive to treatment occurred in 13 of these 19 cats within 1-7 weeks of initial or repeat treatment(s). Severe neurologic disease occurred in 8/13 cats that failed treatment and five cats had recurrences of abdominal lesions. At the time of writing, seven cats were in disease remission."


Research on GC376


Published: 27 August 2020

Feline coronavirus drug GC376 inhibits the main protease of SARS-CoV-2 and blocks virus replication


GC376 has been used to successfully treat FIP in cats as its breakdown product, GC373, effectively inhibits the Mpro of FCoV. Analogs of these drugs also inhibited the MERS CoV Mpro and blocked viral replication in cells at an EC50 of 0.5 μM14. Our studies show GC376 and GC373 to be effective inhibitors of SARS-CoV-2 Mpro, in agreement with previous studies showing GC373 and GC376 possess broad specificity against the Mpro of coronaviruses and calciviruses (Supplementary Table 2)10,13,14,22. Clearly, these drugs need to be advanced quickly into human trials for COVID-19. SARS-CoV-2 is the cause of COVID-19 and is a virus with a significant mutation rate23. Also, in some patients the virus has persisted longer than 2 months with some possibility of re-infection24. Vaccines are critically important, but still likely a year or more away as this virus may present vaccine challenges.

There are many clinical trials testing drugs re-purposed from their original indications. Remdesivir, a polymerase inhibitor developed as a treatment for Ebola virus25 had initially been used in compassion cases, and is now FDA approved for emergency use in patients with COVID-19......


Advantages of the Parent Nucleoside GS-441524 over Remdesivir for Covid-19 Treatment

Victoria C. Yan* and Florian L. Muller

University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, Texas 77054, United States

Cite this: ACS Med. Chem. Lett. 2020, 11, 7, 1361–1366
Publication Date:June 23, 2020
Copyright © 2020 American Chemical Society

 

adam

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In Feb 2020 Professor Pedersen from the University of California was interviewed about Covid-19 pointing out that he had discovered and conducted clinical trials on a very successful cure for a fatal cat coronavirus and that this work was being ignored by public health officials and others.

This drug is Gilead's GS-441524 which Gilead has refused over many years to allow any licensing, research, production or official use in animals let alone humans.

Dr. Niels Pedersen has spent 50 years studying the coronavirus, specifically a strain found in cats, called Feline Infectious Peritonitis or FIP, for short.

View: https://youtu.be/YMhDyTcOv3o


Some other Drs and researchers also highlighted GS-441524 as a potentially important Covid-19 cure but were ignored.

However GS-441524 has been unofficially used over many years to treat cats with the 100% fatal coronavirus FIP and has about a 96% successful cure rate

GS-441524 is almost identical to Gilead's preferred Covid-19 drug Remdesivir (GS-5734)

GS-441524 was also effective against the coronaviruses SARS and MERS

Further researchers have set out based on historic and current research testing and animal use that GS-441524 is probably safer less toxic and more effective against Covid-19 than Remdesivir plus also cheaper and simpler to make and can probably be taken orally unlike Remdesivir

It should be noted that Remdesivir actually converts into GS-441524 in the human body to be effective against Covid-19 and GS-441524 becomes the main metabolite of Remdesivir - so a big question is why give Remdesivir and not GS-441524?

At the very least GS-441524 should have been extensively researched as a Covid-19 treatment.

Requests to Gilead for info on GS-441524 or assistance with research were extensively stonewalled until a recent open letter to the FDA and Gilead made public what was going on.

The FDA subsquently admitted in writing that GS-441524 should be researched as a Covid-19 treatment



Advantages of the Parent Nucleoside GS-441524 over Remdesivir for Covid-19 Treatment

Victoria C. Yan* and Florian L. Muller

Cite this: ACS Med. Chem. Lett. 2020, 11, 7, 1361–1366
Publication Date:June 23, 2020



Further info is in my previous posts
 
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adam

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The following info comes mostly from a web site that focuses on cats with FIP the fatal cat coronavirus. Links below

University of California was actively involved in developing GS-441524 as a treatment for the fatal cat coronavirus FIP and later researchers pointed out it could be equally effective against Covid-19 which Gilead did not investigate.

It looks like Gilead may have decided to move forward with using GS-441524 as a treatment for the fatal Cat coronavirus FIP at the same time that Remdesivir was removed from the list of approved ebola treatments - around August 2019

However once Covid-19 emerged in Jan 2020 Gilead turned its attention back to Remdesivir and dropped GS-441524

For economic reasons ?

Gilead would prefer its Remdesivir patent to be used as a Covid-19 treatment and not GS-441524 which is jointly owned and may also be subject to other patent challanges. See previous posts

At some earlier point it seems that Gilead had filed the patent for GS-441524 in only its name but then in August 2019 amended the application to add the University of California.

I cannot find much separate supporting info however it seems that the patent for GS-441524 is now jointly owned by Gilead and the University of California plus this filing was made at about the same time in August 2019 that Remdesivir was removed from the list of NIH approved ebola drugs.

This might explain Gileads reluctance to promote or research GS-441524 as a treatment for humans or animals until it thought Remdesivir had little future.

It could also explain Gileads back tracking on GS-441524 for cats or humans once Covid-19 came along to save Remdesivir in Jan 2020

Gileads actions on Remdesivir Vs GS-441524 as a Covid-19 or FIP treatment have certainly not been transparent or helpful.

I could be shooting at clouds but as I found this info I thought it was better in the public domain to let others dig deeper to seeif anything is "there there"

See links and info below

Gilead mulls repositioning failed Ebola drug in China virus - Jan 2020


The patent rights to GS-441524 are Gilead Sciences, Inc, and the Regents of the University of California (a patent applicant change was made on the 08/12/2019 to add the Regents of the University of California)



The following is a footnote at the bottom of the related page link

On August 12, 2019 Anthony Fauci, Director of the NIH’s National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases announced that Remdesivir had been removed from the current Ebola clinical trials, citing a mortality rate of 53%.




Gilead has filed the Remdesivir patent in its sole name but the FDA probably has a good claim to jointly own the patent.

Remdesivir, an experimental COVID-19 treatment, has benefited significantly from public funding. Based off publicly available data, Public Citizen estimates that taxpayers are contributing at least $70.5 million to develop remdesivir.[1] The real number is likely higher. We trace the story below.

 

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A recent public posting on 17th September 2020 by a legal firm (Kershaw, Cook & Talley) on its web site about ongoing litigation confirms that Gilead has a history of withholding more effective less harmful drugs it owns, developed at the same time, for commercial reasons - and only releasing the better drug 15 years later as a "new" improved treatment once the more toxic and damaging drug was nearing the end of its patent life

Kershaw, Cook & Talley - statements and comments

Gilead Sciences, Inc. and the federal government have been accused of withholding [GS-441524] a promising treatment for COVID-19, also known as the coronavirus, that may offer “significant advantages” over Remdesivir, currently Gilead’s sole drug undergoing clinical trials for COVID-19 treatment, according to Public Citizen, a non-profit consumer advocacy organization. Kershaw, Cook & Talley is actively pursuing a lawsuit alleging that Gilead engaged in nearly identical conduct regarding the marketing of TDF- and TAF-based drugs used in the treatment and prevention of HIV infection over 20 years earlier.

The allegations Public Citizen brought forward concerning Gilead’s conduct with respect to Remdesivir and GS-441524 is remarkably similar to its alleged conduct in a lawsuit pending in San Francisco Superior Court on behalf of thousands of individuals represented by Kershaw, Cook & Talley and other law firms across the United States. In this lawsuit, plaintiffs allege that Gilead developed TDF-based drugs — commonly known as Viread®, Truvada®, Truvada for PrEP®, Atripla®, Complera® and Stribild® — for the treatment and prevention of HIV infection, while it simultaneously developed TAF-based drugs proved to be safer and at least equally effective at much smaller doses. Gilead’s own studies demonstrated that TDF had a much higher risk of severe side effects, including bone loss and kidney failure. Gilead chose to sell TDF and kept TAF (the safer drug) off the market for nearly 15 years. Plaintiffs allege that this strategy was enacted solely to maximize Gilead’s profits and extend its patent protection for these life-saving drugs. Once the patent on TDF ran out, Gilead then came out with TAF and marketed it as a “new and improved” drug with fewer side effects than TDF.

To date, almost 18,000 plaintiffs have filed lawsuits against Gilead, which have been consolidated in San Francisco Superior Court for pretrial discovery.

In an August 4 letter, Public Citizen and scientists at MD Anderson Cancer Center alleged that both Gilead and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) have been sitting on a drug known as GS-441524 despite the fact that it has shown superior antiviral behavior against the coronavirus in cell cultures compared to Remdesivir. Gilead is accused of keeping GS-441524 on the shelf in order to extend its monopoly over drugs that can be used to treat COVID-19.

“It is sadly predictable that Big Pharma responds to a global pandemic by trying to bring to market only those drugs that maximize its profits,” said Michael Abrams, health researcher with Public Citizen’s Health Research Group and lead author of the letter. “What is alarming here is that federal scientists and Trump administration regulators appear to be willing partners with Gilead in decisions that run distinctly counter to the government’s primary imperative of advancing public health during this worldwide crisis.”

Kershaw, Cook & Talley



Gilead is in a patent dispute with the FDA over patents the FDA was almost certainly entitled to and directly or indirectly funded and/or researched - this patent dispute is related to the same drug Truvada that Gilead is accused of bringing to market even though it had also developed a less toxic and more and/or as effective alternative which Gilead released only many years later



Financial Times report that the company didn’t seek patent protection for the drug to cover PrEP use in the U.S. As a result, the drugmaker could owe $1 billion or more in royalties and damages to the government, according to the newspaper. Gilead disagreed with that conclusion and argued its Truvada patents cover all uses for the drug, the FT reported.

 

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I agree with you - too much wad

I did send a message to a journalist late this week

That was after I found the recent litigation background statement about Gilead, with the specific references to Gilead and GS-441524, plus the 2019 confirmation from Gilead it was blocking research on GS-441524 to support Remdesivir.

I guess I write too much for people to read and its not always very clear

If you know any journalists send them the links to these posts

I have learned about whats happened slowly over time. This has been a way to record the info publically. The info is hidden all over the place

Something does not add up - why block research into a hugely successful coronavirus drug during this crisis in favor of a similar drug that has only limited benefit.


Lets summarize for anyone who hasnt read the extensive previous posts/wad

I only post things if there are credible web links to the info - I have backed it up on the public online wayback archieve incase it should disappear from the web

GS-441524 and Remdesivir are almost chemically identical and produce the same anti coronavirus metabolite

A range of independent university researchers set out GS-441524 looks much more effective against covid-19 than Remdesivir - they show how it is much less toxic, delivers much more of the same anti coronavirus metabolite than Remdesivir ever could, is much cheaper to make and much easier to give to patient etc etc.

GS-441524 was 100% effective in clinical lab animal trials against a 100% fatal cat coroavirus. 96% effective when given to pet animals with the infection.

Gileads GS-441524 patent is less profitable than its Remdesivir patent - as its jointly owned and has a shorter life.

There is nothing stopping Gilead testing both drugs side by side - they produce the same active anti coronavirus metabolite

Gilead is facing litigation claims from 18,000 people that it held back a less toxic better drug until the patent expired on a worse drug that damaged and may have killed people. Gilead had the research for both drugs all the time but it is claimed wanted to make money on both drugs so held back the better drug to release 15 years later as a new improved version. Gilead already faces patent breach claims from the FDA for both the two litigation related drugs and will also over remdesivir if the FDA acts as it should. Gilead has settled some other serious charges

Gilead officially said in 2019 long before coronavirus that it would not allow research development or sales of GS-441524 for humans or animals until Remdesivir was approved by the FDA

This despite having 100% clinical evidence GS-441524 was a cure for a 100% fatal coronavirus illness but no similar clinical evidence to support remdesivir

Note Remdesivir had pretty much failed to treat anything and in 2019 it is set out that it was removed from medical use by the FDA.

After coronavirus Gilead continued to stonewall third party research requests and did not do any GS-441524 research itself etc

There are enough serious people now admitting something is wrong in not researching GS-441524 - even the FDA cannot hide any more after an open letter was sent in August and the FDA agreed to urgently do research in late August. Gilead has not been clear about the priority it will give such research

Did some good guys in the FDA know all along that research should be done on GS-441524 ?

Things do not add up but the mainstream press is ignoring it, and even the specialist press only writes on a limited specific points

No one is asking why did the FDA and Gilead not research GS-441524 and what communication was there before the open letter to the FDA and Gilead forced them to say it should have been and now will be researched ?

Others fast tracked university Covid-19 lab research into a drug similar to GS-441524 that being GC376 - both tested at UC Davis

[GC376 was only about 1/3 as effective as GS-441524 ]

University Professors now report the GC376 drug has been positioned for fast human clinical trials in Canada and FDA approval in the USA all because its patent owners allowed 2020 lab research to go forward and previous clinical trial research shows GC376 acted against a fatal cat coronavirus virus - GC376 was never FDA approved for animal use

UC Davis studies of both drugs show GS-441524 was light years better and was pretty much a 100% coronavirus cure in live animals compared to about 35% for GC376

I have nothing against GC376, the research looks great and well done. However it makes not researching GS-441524 even less understandable

All this is public info

Given whats going on with covid-19 and the status Remdesivir was given by the FDA some answers are due on GS-441524.

I guess the mainstream press are staying away from asking these questions and upsetting big pharma in favor of getting some of the $30 billion pharma spent in 2019 on marketing and advertizing.

Big pharma/healthcare are also the far biggest spenders on lobbying and donating to politicians.

I hoped people here might be interested and look into this themselves - as the process of finding treatments will effect all of us

I found a livescience staff writer article about Remdesivir and GS-441524 and posted on that page as well - which Valentine commented on


Hope other people can take this forward.
 
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SHaines

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Critics say Gilead has blocked the use of or studies on its drug GS-441524 on Covid-19 because Gilead will make less money despite evidence that GS-441524 will be as or more effective than Gileads other drug remdesivir.

When making claims about a topic, please cite sources. While you have many links to a variety of topics, I mean claims made, such as: "Critics say Gilead has blocked the use"

What specific critics? Where have they said this? What specific wording did they use? By allowing folks to see who has the concerns, the specific nature of their concern, and what alternatives they believe to be best, you allow folks to make truly informed decisions.

It's just important for discussions like this that we avoid blanket statements that imply assumptions that may not be correct. For example, if I see this comment, I'm going to want a source that I can read up on so I can get the full context:

"Experts concluded ground beef is the perfect pizza topping."

People who love ground beef on pizza won't even question this. Literally everyone else is going to want to read the source of that conclusion.
 

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When making claims about a topic, please cite sources. While you have many links to a variety of topics, I mean claims made, such as: "Critics say Gilead has blocked the use"

What specific critics? Where have they said this? What specific wording did they use? By allowing folks to see who has the concerns, the specific nature of their concern, and what alternatives they believe to be best, you allow folks to make truly informed decisions.

It's just important for discussions like this that we avoid blanket statements that imply assumptions that may not be correct. For example, if I see this comment, I'm going to want a source that I can read up on so I can get the full context:

"Experts concluded ground beef is the perfect pizza topping."

People who love ground beef on pizza won't even question this. Literally everyone else is going to want to read the source of that conclusion.

Sorry I did not make clear that all the links to all the various claims are in the previous posts above starting from 28th and 30th August onward

Please note I only make serious comments that can be backed up by serious third party links. I mentioned this on other posts

Just to reclarify the links I use are from mainstream sources medical news websites, legal firm web site postings, government web sites, well reputed citizens rights groups etc [not conspiracy sites]

I have set out a few of the previous links I posted a little later below to fully answer your questions

However to show how questionable the situation is regarding GS-441524 research please read the info and links I have set out later below, and in other posts, about how another drug GC-376 (owned by another company) has been fast tracked for human trials in about 2 month (from at least March 2020) and is now already "ready", for phase 1 clinical trials while GS-441524 which was previously tested against GC-376 has been ignored. It seems Gileads is favoring its other drug remdesivier while an independent party has acted differently

Why is the GC-376 vs GS-441524 comparison valid ?

Because GC-376 and GS-441524 were tested against each other at University of California trials over some years, and GS-441524 proved to have an almost 100% cure rate against a fatal cat coronavirus while GC-376 had only about 35% cure rate.

Not only that but researchers also looked at using remdesivir in the animal trials and decided in favor of GS-441524, however after the great results Gilead refused to allow GS-441524 to be developed - (all this is documented and confirmed without meaningful explanation by Gilead)

Additionally not only has GS-441524 been researched for many years from around 2009, and has proved effective in lab tests against the SARS and MERS coronavirus, but it is the main effective anti Covid-19 metabolite of Gileads Remdesivir

In general terms researchers have set out that GS-441524 is much less toxic than Remdesivir (papers linked below and previous posts etc). To be clear Remdesivir is expelled from the body and GS-441524 is what remains to fight Covid-19. For the body to convert remdesivir to GS-441524 makes little obvious sense when one can take GS-441524 directly (and not stress the body with the conversion and have a lower toxicity level etc) plus remdesivir has many other drawbacks about how it is made and given to patients - a side by side study of the 2 drugs was the logical way forward. The question is why wasnt it done which no one is asking ?

Finally as well lab tests in support of GC-376 human trials, the University of Alberta researchers (who look like they have done great work) stated

“The fact that this drug [GC-376] has already been developed and shown to be successful in treating feline infectious peritonitis [a fatal cat coronavirus], it really bodes well,” Lemieux says.

[GS-441524 was almost 100% effective so should have even more potential while GC-376 was only effective in about 35% of cases]


Next to quickly answer your Gilead GS-441524 questions

"Critics say Gilead has blocked the use"
What specific critics? Where have they said this? What specific wording did they use?

Below are some of the links I previously posted with quotes directly from those links (mostly already posted before) on Gilead and GS-441524 and the direct and indirect blocking of research. Links and quotes to answer your questions above


Gilead Sciences, Inc. and the federal government apparently have been sitting on a potentially promising coronavirus treatment (GS-441524) for months that may offer significant advantages over the closely related antiviral drug remdesivir, possibly to maximize profits, Public Citizen and two scientists specializing in cancer drug development said today [4th August] in a letter to the company and senior federal health officials.


4th August 2020 PDF of 9 page open letter and research to Gilead FDA etc - selected quotes

It is unclear why Gilead and federal scientists have not been pursuing GS-441524 as aggressively as remdesivir, but the answer may be found in the corporation’s patent holdings, the letter said. Gilead holds patents on both agents, but the earliest patent approval date on remdesivir is 2015, whereas the earliest on GS-441524 is 2010. As a result, the corporation’s monopoly over remdesivir may last five years longer than that for GS-441524, allowing Gilead to make substantially greater profits from the sale of remdesivir as a COVID-19 treatment.

Conclusions

GS-441524 is the parental nucleoside of remdesivir that has demonstrated strong anti-coronavirus activity in vitroand in vivo. GS-441524 further demonstrates comparable or superior anti-SARS-CoV-2 activity to remdesivir in vitro. Against a deadly coronavirus in cats, GS-441524 has yielded exceptional cure rates. As the predominant and persistent(half-life equals24 hours)circulating metabolite in remdesivir-treated patients,there is strong scientific justification for its further investigation in clinical trials for COVID-19.

We look forward to your prompt response to this letter with either a commitment and plan to pursue GS-441524 as a treatment for COVID-19, or supportable evidence of why it is necessary to defer development of this seemingly obvious drug candidate. Finally,if Gilead is unwilling to pursue further investigation and development of GS-441524, we request that the company immediately permit other academic and federal scientists to do so.


Late August 2020

Public Citizen received a response letter from the director of the NIH’s National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences, Dr. Christopher Austin, on Aug. 22, stating that “Scientists in our Division of Preclinical Innovation have reviewed the literature and agree that [GS-441524] merits further exploration,” and that NIH scientists will quickly conduct preclinical studies of the drug.


May 2020

The attractive profile of GS-441524 from both manufacturing and clinical perspectives raises this question: Why hasn’t Gilead opted to advance this compound to the clinic? We would be remiss for not mentioning patents, and thus profits. The first patent on GS-441524 was issued in 2009, while the first patent for remdesivir was issued in 2017.

We aren’t the only ones questioning Gilead’s strategy. We have spoken with a number of chemists, biochemists, veterinarians, and others who are also surprised that GS-441524 has remained out of the spotlight. Veterinarians we spoke to have noted that the strong antiviral activity of GS-441524 has resulted in a “miraculous turn of events” for cats infected with feline coronavirus, which was once considered a death sentence.

Given GS-441524’s optimal properties, we — along with the millions of people awaiting an effective treatment for Covid-19 — are left to wonder why Gilead isn’t giving it the same attention it is giving remdesivir. The world can only hope it isn’t for the sake of protecting its intellectual property.

Victoria C. Yan is a graduate research assistant specializing in phosphonate chemistry at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston. Florian L. Muller is an assistant professor specializing in cancer drug development in MD Anderson’s Department of Cancer Systems Imaging.

(see Q&A below article for further info)



September 2020 - Kershaw, Cook & Talley

The allegations Public Citizen brought forward concerning Gilead’s conduct with respect to Remdesivir and GS-441524 is remarkably similar to its alleged conduct in a lawsuit pending in San Francisco Superior Court on behalf of thousands of individuals represented by Kershaw, Cook & Talley and other law firms across the United States. In this lawsuit, plaintiffs allege that Gilead developed TDF-based drugs .........while it simultaneously developed TAF-based drugs proved to be safer and at least equally effective at much smaller doses. Gilead’s own studies demonstrated that TDF had a much higher risk of severe side effects, including bone loss and kidney failure. Gilead chose to sell TDF and kept TAF (the safer drug) off the market for nearly 15 years. Plaintiffs allege that this strategy was enacted solely to maximize Gilead’s profits and extend its patent protection for these life-saving drugs. Once the patent on TDF ran out, Gilead then came out with TAF and marketed it as a “new and improved” drug with fewer side effects than TDF.

To date, almost 18,000 plaintiffs have filed lawsuits against Gilead, which have been consolidated in San Francisco Superior Court for pretrial discovery.


October 2020 a separate lawsuit


According to allegations raised in a product liability lawsuit recently filed by a group of 10 people, Gilead Sciences, Inc. allegedly sold inferior, potentially life-threatening HIV drugs knowing it had a safer formulation, in order to increase its profit margins at the expense of patients.

See some of the specific petition claims below


John Milligan, Gilead’s President and Chief Executive Officer, later admitted to investment analysts, the real reason Gilead abandoned the TAF design was that TAF was too different from TDF. Once Gilead’s first TDF product, Viread, was on the market, Gilead did not want to hurt TDF sales by admitting that its TDF-based products are unreasonably and unnecessarily unsafe.

In addition, Gilead knew that by withholding the safer TAF design, it could extend the longevity of its HIV drug franchise and make billions two times over: first, with TDF medications until TDF patent expiration, which would begin by no later than 2018, and second, with TAF medications until TAF patent expiration as late as 2032. Only once Gilead realized billions in sales through most of the TDF patent life did it seek to market safer TAF-based versions of its HIV medications.


See Gilead Press release August 2019 to VIN News Service for veterinarians


See section starting "Fate of legal drugs in the U.S."

A spokesperson for Gilead provided the following statement to VIN News:

"Gilead in the past has worked to make compounds with the potential to help animals available to developers with the expertise to advance medicines for veterinary use. This is why we shared GS-441524 with UC Davis to research its impact on feline infectious peritonitis (FIP).

"At this time, we are not providing GS-441524 to other parties until remdesivir has FDA approval. This is to avoid any interference with the regulatory process, which could risk the approval of remdesivir by the FDA to treat human patients with Ebola or other filoviruses.

"We are, however, exploring options that would allow us to share GS-441524 before the FDA review is complete."


[Gilead did nothing meaningful from August 2019 to August 2020]


Summary of the Gilead GS-441524 posts to date

In summary since February 2020 and definitely by May 2020 researchers, including those from the University of Texas, have been pressing Gilead to allow full research into GS-441524 without getting a meaningful response or assistance from Gilead.

In August the Public Citizen organization and researchers from the University of Texas wrote a joint detailed open letter to the FDA, Gilead and Dr Fauci etc asking why no research was being done despite GS-441524 having been well researched since 2009, and compared to Gileads other drug remdesivir was cheaper and simpler to make and give to patients, looked more effective than remdesivir and had proved effective in treating cats against 100% fatal coronavirus in both lab cats and trials on domestic pet cats (and had been preferred over remdesivir in the UC Davis trials cat trials which Gilead was involved with).

It was noted in the research that remdesivir converts into GS-441524, and because of this GS-441524 is much less toxic than remdesivir, so it was doubly unclear why Gilead would want to not allow independent research on GS-441524 during this time of crisis or at any time, (unless it was about a financial issue).

It seems clear if there was a problem with GS-441524 it would also equally apply in remdesivir - so surely Gilead would want everyone to know of any health issues ?

Additionally in lab tests GS-441524 showed it was effective against SARS and MERS and looks effective against Covid-19 as it is the effective metabolite of remdesivir - ie what remdesivir converts into

The FDA responded in late August to the Public Citizen letter saying that it would start research as the research has merit.

However little of no real or meaningful updates have been released on what research is going to be done, or why it had not already started.

There are very serious issues here about why Gilead has not allowed others to research GS-441524 or in any way promoted research along side remdesiver.

That this is a real issue can be seen through the difference between how GC-376 owned by another company (Anivive) and GS-441524 has been dealt with - it highlights the concerns raised by independent researchers about the FDA and Gileads failure to research GS-441524 and Gileads' conduct on other drugs.

GC-376 and GS-441524 were both tested in UC Davis trials

From my other posts you will see that GC-376 is a very much less effective drug than GS-441524

GS-441524 was 100% effective in lab cat trials (96% in pet cats) while GC-376 was only about 35% effective lab cat trials

Just to be clear GC-376 has never been approved for animal or human use and prior to Covid-19 the Anivive time line for GC-376 animal use was 5 to 10 years for FDA approval.

However the article below shows GC-376 was fast tracked and being researched by the University of Alberta in March 2020 because its owner Anivive was supportive


So University of Alberta did a great job on getting GC-376 fast tracked through 2 months of University studies and by August research reports were published - and it is stated that GC-376 is expected to shortly go to human trials in Canada and the US - but GS-441524 is left unresearched by Gilead or the FDA and University of Texas researchers are effectively blocked by Gilead (and the FDA ?)

See article below

[GC-376] "Fast-tracked research leads to phase 1 clinical trials."

[GC-376] Antiviral used to treat cat coronavirus also works against SARS-CoV-2: U of A researchers



The University of Alberta researchers have stated

“The fact that this drug [GC-376] has already been developed and shown to be successful in treating feline infectious peritonitis [a fatal cat coronavirus], it really bodes well,” Lemieux says.

[on that basis GS-441524 should be another even better candidate]


Links to Anivive comments




Gilead as a Corporate

Gileads overall conduct on a range of issues has been questionable and shows the importance of acting properly, which can create long term financial value or failing to do so may result in a damaging of value or the creating of huge problems

Gilead may have damaged itself by its actions, and certainly has had its ethical position called into doubt which cannot be good for any company but especially so for a health related company which is being accused of acting in a manner that disregards human and animal life

These suggestions are based on quotes or claims set out publicly in, court filings about Gilead withholding better drugs for profit and at the risk of peoples health or even possibly their lives, press comments by Gilead about not allowing research and development or sale of drugs that cure animals,
open letters to Gilead about not allowing or blocking the use of GS-441524 to save animal lives or for human research in favor of another unproven and almost identical drug (remdesivir), litigation over Gileads use of federal funds and research facilities and then Gilead seeking exclude the FDA from patents on several occasions, litigation against Gilead for withholding drugs that are better to increase their profits this at the cost of peoples health etc.


Gilead in Patent disputes with FDA over other drugs and possibly over remdesivir




(please review the previous older posts back to the 28th August and other separate posts for more info and links)




 
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adam

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GS-441524 Effectively Inhibits SARS-CoV-2 Infection in Mice Models

doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2020.10.26.353300

October 27, 2020.

The outbreak of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) rapidly spreads across worldwide and becomes a global pandemic. Remdesivir is the only COVID-19 treatment approved by U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA); however, its effectiveness is still under questioning as raised by the results of a large WHO Solidarity Trial.

Herein, we report that the parent nucleotide of remdesivir, GS-441524, potently inhibits the replication of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) in Vero E6 and other cells.

It exhibits good plasma distribution and longer half-life (t1/2=4.8h) in rat PK study. GS-441524 is highly efficacious against SARS-CoV-2 in AAV-hACE2 transduced mice and murine hepatitis virus (MHV) in mice, reducing the viral titers in CoV-attacked organs, without noticeable toxicity.

Given that GS-441524 was the predominant metabolite of remdesivir in the plasma, the anti-COVID-19 effect of remdesivir may partly come from the effect of GS-441524.

Our results also supported that GS-441524 as a promising and inexpensive drug candidate in the treatment of COVID-19 and future emerging CoVs diseases.

Competing Interest Statement

The authors have declared no competing interest.

 

adam

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Still no updates from Gilead on when GS-441524 will be researched

The Texas Uni info from researchers meeting with Gilead show Gilead will not progress despite good data and Remdesivir removed as covid treatment by FDA

View: https://mobile.twitter.com/victoriacyanide/status/1330991137117663243

They also told us that they want to focus on new, lung-targeted prodrug of remdesivir. They didn’t seem to want to move GS-441524 in parallel, even with all this data/human experience w it. Might be relying on NCATS to move GS-441524 forward for them, my guess...

In private meetings with us, Gilead showed data from SARS-CoV-2 challenge experiments in NHP for RDV (10 mpk loading + 5 mpk ) vs. GS-441524 (20 mpk) for 5 days. Same reduction in viral titers for both. Advantages w '524 is higher and safer dosing + can be orally administered.

It's all about numbers of years of exclusivity.



 
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Why is GILEAD hiding its own latest GS-441524 research and other mice trial data showing GS-441524s effectiveness against Covid19.

No GILEAD media or press release

"Metabolite GS-441524 Efficiently Inhibits SARS-CoV-2 Infection in Mouse Model,"

Only veterinarian news service VIN NEWS and a medical blog is reporting this good news .

What is going on ?

Why is nothing being done?

VIN NEWS reports Texas Uni researchers study that GS-441524 is likely very effective against Covid19 and also much less toxic than Remdesivir is borne out by Gilead's own study but not reported.

FDA/NIH confirmed in August GS-441524 should be researched as an independent Covid19 treatment

Plus GS-441524 is more easily synthesized and can be taken orally or by aerosol delivery.

Research shows "GS-441524 can be present in the serum at concentrations 1,000-fold higher than remdesivir (118)."

Remdesivir is delivered intravenously.


A search of Gileads own website fails to show this positive Gilead research on GS-441524

despite the VIN pdf showing all authors work or worked for Gilead, may have stock options and address for correspondence is Joy Y. Feng @gilead.com

Still no mainstream reporting on Gilead or NIH human trials and other testing of GS-441524.

New study "Metabolite GS-441524 Efficiently Inhibits SARS-CoV-2 Infection in Mouse Model," was released online as a preprint on the bioRxiv* server, prior to undergoing the peer-review process.


"Given the efficacy of GS-441524 in the treatment of [fatal conronavirus] FIP, it has been suggested that there may be advantages to the use of the parent (GS-441524), rather than the prodrug (remdesivir) in human trials (117). Remdesivir appears to be rapidly metabolized in the serum to GS-441524 rather than entering cells intact (118, 119), and GS-441524 can be present in the serum at concentrations 1,000-fold higher than remdesivir (118)."


pdf copy of recent Gilead tests on GS-441524 and Remdesivir provided by VIN NEWS


Prospective FIP drugs may benefit from COVID-19 research

In the years since a Gilead Sciences antiviral drug was shown to reverse the progression of feline infectious peritonitis (FIP), a cadre of veterinarians and cat owners have lobbied the biotechnology company to bring it to market for veterinary use. While neither public cajoling nor a thriving black market in knockoffs have persuaded Gilead to act, the COVID-19 pandemic might.

The reason is that the drug, named GS-441524, is being investigated as a possible treatment for COVID-19. GS, as it's known for short, is closely related to remdesivir, an antiviral compound also made by Gilead that was the first drug approved, (on a limited, emergency basis) by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to treat COVID-19. Both COVID-19 and FIP are caused by coronaviruses.

In August, an official at the National Institutes of Health said government scientists would investigate GS as a treatment for COVID-19.
If fully approved for humans, GS could at some point be available for veterinarians to use off-label for cats with FIP.
The push to appraise GS as a COVID-19 treatment came from a pair of researchers at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center: Florian Muller, an assistant professor, and graduate student Victoria Yan. In a paper published in June by the American Chemical Society, they make a case, based on laboratory analysis, that GS is comparable if not superior to remdesivir in acting against SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19.

Yan told the VIN News Service that Gilead had shared data with her showing that GS has essentially equal potency as remdesivir in reducing SARS-CoV-2 viral loads in primates.

The authors maintain that GS is also less toxic than remdesivir. (That claim is borne out by Gilead's own study.) GS is more easily synthesized, they say, and should be more conducive to oral or aerosol delivery. Remdesivir is delivered intravenously.
In a letter in August to various chiefs at federal health agencies and Gilead CEO Daniel O'Day, Yan and Muller, joined by the consumer advocacy organization Public Citizen, pressed the company and the government to "promptly pursue" the development of GS as a treatment for COVID-19 "or publicly provide evidence why it is not scientifically or medically feasible ..."
The authors question whether Gilead's actions are driven only by profit:
"It is unclear why Gilead and federal scientists have not been pursuing GS-441524 as aggressively as remdesivir, but we cannot help but note that there are significant financial incentives tied to Gilead's current patent holdings. Specifically, Gilead holds patents on both agents, but the earliest patent approval date on remdesivir is 2015 whereas the earliest on GS-441524 is 2010. Thus, Gilead's monopoly power over remdesivir may have at least five additional years of enforceability beyond that of GS-441524."
In response to questions about the Yan and Muller study, Gilead spokesperson Chris Ridley told VIN News in November that the company prioritized remdesivir over GS for several reasons, including evidence indicating remdesivir is more effective in test tubes and animal models than GS in blocking viral replication; and a finding that remdesivir was more active in lab tests against multiple coronaviruses, including SARS-CoV-2.
"Reinforcing this decision was the ability to rapidly progress clinical trials with remdesivir, given the urgency of the global pandemic," Ridley said by email. "Remdesivir had already been tested in human clinical trials, including both in healthy volunteers and as a potential treatment for Ebola virus disease; the safety data from these studies allowed us to quickly begin clinical trials in patients with COVID-19."
He pointed out that there are no formal toxicology studies on GS at dosing levels required to demonstrate efficacy in humans, and added that existing stockpiles of remdesivir supported "the rapid initiation of clinical trials and compassionate use." While prioritizing remdesivir to treat COVID-19 in humans, Gilead is exploring options to work with other parties on further assessment of GS, and pursuing options for out-licensing GS for veterinary use, according to Ridley.
Sixteen days after the Texas researchers' letter was sent, Dr. Christopher Austin, director of the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences at the NIH, affirmed in a response to Yan, Muller and Public Citizen that GS deserved a closer look.
"We are planning to independently test the therapeutic hypothesis for GS-441524 in treating SARS-CoV-2 infection ..." he wrote, saying he expected the preclinical studies to be conducted quickly.
A second company with a promising FIP treatment also is pivoting to target COVID-19. The veterinary biotech company Anivive Lifesciences announced in May that it was "repurposing" its veterinary drug GC376 as a COVID-19 therapy. GC376 showed promise as a treatment for FIP in a field trialpublished in 2017.
Pet owners have told VIN News they used black-market versions of GC376 to successfully reverse FIP in their cats. However, GS generally is considered more effective against the disease and appears to dominate black-market use.
In its May announcement, Anivive said it remained dedicated to developing GC376 for veterinary patients.

 
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See previous post for latest medical research news on GS-441524 as an effective Covid19 treatment that has not been covered by Gilead or mainstream media

Here
is a good link from Texas Univ researchers showing why GS-441524 so effective against Covid-19 compared to Remdesivir


Basically Gilead wont address what's the point of using complex Remdesivir when GS-441524 is what reaches the lungs and is what combats Covid19?

Also Remdesivir is much more toxic. GS-441524 can be given in much higher doses directly

Remdesivir really seems to make little logical sense when compared to GS-441524.
 

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Gilead continues to ignor GS-441524 despite more and new positive studies on the ease of use, effectiveness and cost benefit of GS-441524 plus the

WHO saying Remdesivir is not effective against Covid-19 and the FDA changing its treatment status

New Study on Orally Administered GS-441524 in Dogs to treat Covid-19

This study on dogs indicates GS-441524 could potentially be developed as pill and orally available against COVID-19 on an outpatient basis.

GS-441524 is much less susceptible to COVID-19 mutations than is the spike protein.

In cell cultures, the activity of GS-441524 against SARS-CoV-2 infection has been found to be a quick acting long lasting and powerfully inhibitory.

“As a prodrug inhibitor of the SARS-CoV-2 RNA-dependent RNA polymerase (RdRp), GS-441524 is aptly poised to demonstrate consistent efficacy among new mutations of SARS-CoV-2, as RdRp is much less susceptible to efficacy-altering mutations than is the spike protein.”

These results have driven the current study on the pharmacokinetics of GS-441524 in dogs, since they indicate that this drug could potentially be developed as an orally available agent against COVID-19 on an outpatient basis.

In mouse studies, using either SARS-CoV-2 or murine hepatitis virus (MHV), which is closely related to the former, GS-441524 has been found to reduce viral loads in affected organs with encouragingly low toxicity levels.

In cats, naturally infected with the feline coronavirus (FCoV), and showing feline infectious peritonitis (FIP), the use of GS-441524 subcutaneously has shown a cure rate of 96%.

*Important Notice
bioRxiv publishes preliminary scientific reports that are not peer-reviewed and, therefore, should not be regarded as conclusive, guide clinical practice/health-related behavior, or treated as established information.

Studies continue to show the low toxicity of GS-441524 at doses far higher than Remdesivir could ever be consider, plus GS-441524 starts acting sooner and lasts longer in the lungs

Journal reference:
Yan, V. C. et al. (2021). Pharmacokinetics of Orally Administered GS-441524 in Dogs. bioRxiv preprint. doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.02.04.429674, https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.02.04.429674v1


 

adam

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Still no news on GS-441524 from the FDA. Strange how Dr Fauci was so quick to test and back Remdesivir also by Gilead but fails to do so despite FDA saying in Sept 2020 GS-441524 should be quickly tested as the studies were very promising and is the key anti covid-19 metabolite of remdesivir and appears much more potent.


Gilead continues to promote remdesivir despite FDA withdrawing its covid-19 treatment status




Victoria Yan
@victoriacyan
ide

Hooray for continued development of antivirals for #COVID19! But why does #galidesivir get a mention but not #GS441524
@RobertFService?
@BioCrystPharma
already announced that
@NIAIDNews
discontinued development of galidesivir for #SARSCoV2