Medicines Patent Pool Partners with Liverpool University On HIV Nanomedicines

By Catherine Saez

The Medicines Patent Pool has signed a collaborative agreement with the University of Liverpool to develop HIV nanomedicines.

According to a press release, the agreement includes an MPP licence for the university’s Solid Drug Nanoparticle (SDN) technology. This new agreement seeks to accelerate the development of the World Health Organization-recommended antiretrovirals as nanomedicines, it said.

The agreement covers “a territory of all 135 low-and middle-income countries and two high-income countries in Africa,” the release said. The two countries in Africa are Equatorial Guinea and Seychelles. “Licensees based anywhere in the world will have the right to make, use and distribute lower cost ARVs based on SDN technology,” according to the release.

According to Katie Moore at MPP, “dosage reduction of existing ARVs has become increasingly important in light of its potential benefits such as ease of administration and fewer side effects, as well as overall cost savings thanks to the reduction of active pharmaceutical ingredients (API) required.”

“The MPP-UoL agreement seeks to adapt current ARVs such as atazanavir, cobicistat, lopinavir, raltegravir, ritonavir, and combinations into nanomedicines that contain the same pharmaceutical properties and efficacy profiles, but at drastically reduced doses,” she told Intellectual Property Watch. “With cost reductions we expect that the international community can extend treatment to more people thus contributing to the WHO’s treat-all recommendations.”

According to the release, “nanomedicines have been approved for the treatment of cancers, hepatitis and other disease areas, but the application is relatively new to the area of HIV.”

“The university’s SDN Technology allows the reformulation of poorly soluble and insoluble drugs into water dispersible formulations and can improve the delivery of drugs into the body. This improved bioavailability allows reductions in the drug dosage and enables those drugs previously unsuitable for oral delivery,” the release said.