AIM announces principal investigator for Ampligen, FluMist clinical study

AIM ImmunoTech (AIM) announced that Paul Goepfert, MD, of the University of Alabama-Birmingham, has agreed to act as the Principal Investigator for the company’s planned clinical study in the combination of Ampligen and AstraZeneca’s (AZN) FluMist as an intranasal vaccine for influenza, including avian influenza. Ampligen would serve as a vaccine adjuvant. This will be a follow-up study to a previous clinical trial at UAB, which indicated that intranasal delivery of Ampligen after the intranasal delivery of the FluMist seasonal influenza vaccine not only increased the immune response to seasonal variants in the vaccine by greater than four-fold, but most importantly induced cross-reactive secretory Immunoglobulin A against highly pathogenic avian influenza virus strains H5N1, H7N9 and H7N3. AIM has engaged Amarex Clinical Research, its Clinical Research Organization, with the preparation of an Investigational New Drug application and the eventual management of the planned clinical study. A key next step will be to identify study funding through industry or governmental grants.