U.S. Government Buys 100,000 Doses of COVID-19 Therapeutic

The U.S. Department of the Health and Human Services and the Department of Defense jointly announced an agreement with Merck to support advanced development and large-scale manufacturing of their investigational therapeutic MK-7110 (CD24Fc) treat hospitalized patients with severe or critical COVID-19.

The U.S. stated they would provide approximately $356 million to Merck to deliver up to 100,000 doses of MK-7110 by June 30, 2021.

The investigational therapeutic is a promising first-in-class fusion protein and immune modulator. Immune modulators have the potential to minimize the damaging effects of an overactive immune response to COVID-19.

New Jersey-based OncoImmune, a recent Merck acquisition, announced on September 24, 2020, positive top-line findings from an interim efficacy analysis of a Phase 3 study evaluating CD24Fc, now known as MK-7110.