Last night French biotech company Genfit released the results of their widely anticipated Phase III study on Elafibranor, a NASH therapeutic that had shown tremendous promise in earlier trials.
Unfortunately, the trial failed to meet both the primary and secondary endpoints. The treated patients response wasn’t statistically meaningful versus the placebo control group. Genfit’s CEO Pascal Prigent said “These results are highly disappointing.” The stock is down by over 65% today.
This setback leaves us with just Abbvie’s cenicriviroc study to look forward to this year, due in late 2020 if there are no delays due to the Covid crisis. Intercept’s Ocaliva is due for FDA approval soon, but seems to have limited effectiveness in specific NASH cases.
The best treatment for NASH and NAFLD remains a healthy diet and lifetsytle changes for the foreseeable future.
