(Yicai Global) June 28 -- Junshi Biosciences’ shares slumped after the Chinese drugmaker confirmed that distribution of its antibody combination therapy for Covid-19, developed with Eli Lilly, has been suspended in the United States.

Junshi Biosciences [SHA: 688180] ended today 2.1 percent lower in Shanghai at CNY82.03 (USD12.70), after earlier falling as much as 4 percent. Its Hong Kong-listed stock [HKG: 1877] lost 3.6 percent to HKD34.30 (USD8.28), recovering from a 10 percent drop.

The Shanghai-based company also said in a statement this morning that the emergency use authorization for the therapy has not been cancelled, which means its use in the US could resume in the future.

The US Department of Health and Human Services announced on June 25 that it would stop the therapy’s distribution until further notice. It cited the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which found that the P.1 variant first seen in Brazil and the South African B.1.351 variant made up over 11 percent of cases in the country, with the figure rising.

The antibody combination therapy is effective with other variants of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes Covid-19, Junshi Biosciences said. It is effective on both the B.1.1.7/Alpha variant, first detected in the United Kingdom, and the B.1.617.1/Delta variant, first detected in India, the company said, citing the paper Tackling Covid-19 with Neutralizing Monoclonal Antibodies published this month in Cell, a peer-reviewed scientific journal.

The therapy is a single intravenous injection with 1,400 milligrams of Etesevimab and 700 milligrams of Bamlanivimab. The US Food and Drug Administration approved it for emergency use in February to treat Covid-19 patients aged 12 and above with mild and moderate symptoms.

Etesevimab is a Covid-19 neutralizing antibody co-developed by Junshi Biosciences and the Institute of Microbiology, under the Chinese Academy of Sciences. Junshi granted the license for the therapy’s clinical development, production and commercialization in regions excluding China to Eli Lilly in May last year. 

Bamlanivimab is an antibody jointly developed by Eli Lilly and Vancouver-based AbCellera. It was given emergency use approval by the FDA in November and can be used with Covid-19 patients with mild and moderate symptoms.

The FDA, however, revoked approval for Bamlanivimab in April because it was not effective enough in treating the mutant novel coronavirus. About 20 percent of mutant viruses were resistant to Bamlanivimab in the US as of the middle of March, the FDA noted.

But Junshi Biosciences said emergency use authorization of the antibody combination therapy involving Etesevimab and Bamlanivimab has not been revoked.

Eli Lilly will continue to talk with regulators in all regions except China to ensure that suitable patients have access to the therapy, the statement added.

Editor: Peter Thomas