Source: The Life Sciences Report
May 26, 2017 (Investorideas.com Newswire) NASH is an epidemic in the U.S., with more than 100 million people believed to be affected. Yet no FDA-approved treatments are available, with the exception of liver transplantation for end-stage disease. In part two of his interview with The Life Sciences Report, Ed Arce, managing director in equity research and senior analyst covering companies in the biopharmaceuticals and specialty pharmaceuticals sectors for H.C. Wainwright, and organizer of the recent inaugural NASH Investor Conference, says that small companies are rushing to fill the pipeline, with numerous compounds in trials
This is Part 2 of an interview with Ed Arce on NASH. Click here to read Part 1.
The Life Sciences Report: In part one, we discussed NASH (nonalcoholic steatohepatitis), the disease’s progression, the public health crisis it is becoming, and what action the larger companies are taking. What are some small-cap companies active in NASH?
Ed Arce: I’ll first focus on a much smaller subset of the overall disease—the most severe—and those are the patients who have already progressed to cirrhosis. As with the milder patients, there are no FDA-approved therapies. For cirrhotics, there’s really little else other than liver transplant.
A couple of companies are focused specifically on those patients who have cirrhosis from NASH. The first one is Galectin Therapeutics Inc. (GALT:NASDAQ). It has a compound that hits the galectin-3 pathway. This has been shown in a number of preclinical models to have pretty robust effects on fibrosis, as well as cirrhosis, in several animal models. Galectin has an ongoing Phase 2b trial that is expected to read out in December. The compound is being studied in that trial to either improve the cirrhosis below a certain point (MELD <10), or to prevent further progression of disease. That’s one drug that is really focused on those patients.