10:32 AM EST, 03/03/2021 (MT Newswires) -- Resverlogix Corp. (RVX.TO) and QIMR Berghofer Medical Research Institute in Australia have published a new article showing evidence of apabetalone's potential benefit on SARS-CoV-2 (COVID-19). The article was published on the pre-print server, bioRxiv, at the request of the reviewing scientific journal.

"We are excited that we can finally share publicly some of the incredible early results of our collaborative COVID-19 research program," said Donald McCaffrey, President and CEO of Resverlogix. "Not only does apabetalone treatment reduce SARS-CoV-2 infection in cardiomyocytes [heart muscle cells], but it also prevents cardiac dysfunction induced by cytokine-storm. These findings showcase the unique dual-mechanism of apabetalone as a potential therapeutic for COVID-19 and provide strong support for human trials."

"Many re-purposed drugs have failed in clinical trials for COVID-19," said Associate Professor James Hudson, head of the Cardiac Bioengineering Research Group at QIMR Berghofer. "We sought a different approach to firstly understand mechanistically how COVID-19 could be driving cardiac dysfunction seen in many patients. After detailed studies we identified bromodomain-containing protein 4 as a key mediator of dysfunction and BET inhibitors were very effective at blocking this response. In the pursuit to translate these findings to the clinic, we formed a very exciting collaboration with Resverlogix to test apabetalone, which we also found was very effective in our models."

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