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To: Michail Shadkin who wrote (2262)6/16/2001 4:52:08 PM
From: jjs_ynot  Read Replies (1) | Respond to of 6873
 
What is amazing is all of this enthusiasmabout IMNR (REMUNE) based on a report from some Bulletin Board company about an obscure Southeast Asian study with obviously no controls or peer review.

This is just after controlled clinical trials in Spain (where the controls are much more liberal than the US) showed no efficacy, even to the most liberal 20 percent confidence standard. That is, conclusive evidence of no effect.



To: Michail Shadkin who wrote (2262)7/7/2001 6:57:22 PM
From: Glenn Petersen  Respond to of 6873
 
Please let this worthless pile of junk get back to $5 so I can reshort.

Made it to $4.95; would have been great to recycle.

dailynews.yahoo.com

Friday July 6 7:02 PM ET
Immune Response Stock Hit on Pfizer Move
By Ransdell Pierson and Toni Clarke

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Shares of Immune Response Corp. (NasdaqNM:IMNR - news) fell more than 40 percent on Friday after the fledgling biotechnology company said its partner, Pfizer Inc. (NYSE:PFE - news), is discontinuing development of its experimental Aids drug, Remune.

Carlsbad, California-based Immune Response saw its stock fall $2.01, or 44 percent, to close at $2.58 on Nasdaq. Earlier in the day they fell as low as $1.80.

Pfizer, the world's biggest pharmaceuticals company, dropped the drug following disappointing clinical trial results. It's an action that could prove fatal for the smaller company, analysts said.

``More often than not an event like this is a death blow,'' said Neil Sweig, an analyst at Ryan, Beck & Co. in New York. ''There's a less than fifty-fifty chance that another company will pick up where Pfizer left off.''

The news doesn't come as a big surprise to AIDS (news - web sites) groups.

``The majority of the work that's been done on this medication has been disappointing, so I don't think there will be a huge let-down in the community,'' said Jeff Myers, medical director of the Valley Health Care Center, which provides care to AIDS patients on behalf of the nonprofit Los Angeles-based AIDS Healthcare Foundation. ``I don't think Remune's demise is going to leave a huge hole in terms of what we need to battle this disease.''

Pfizer's relationship with Immune Response began, indirectly, in June 1998, when Immune Response agreed to co-develop Remune with Agouron Pharmaceuticals Inc. Agouron was later acquired by Warner-Lambert Co., which in turn was bought last summer by Pfizer.

In dropping Remune, Pfizer is conducting the typical pruning that follows an acquisition, Swieg said.

``Pfizer had been saying at various meetings that the jury was still out on Remune, and in the end they obviously decided it didn't fit into their research and development program,'' he said.

Immune Response received $47 million from Pfizer and Agouron to develop Remune, according to Laura Hansen, a spokeswoman for Immune Response. At the end of the first quarter, the company had $21 million left in cash, enough to fund operations through the end of 2001, Hansen said.

In 1995, Immune Response licensed rights to develop and sell Remune in Southeast Asia to Trinity Medical Group USA, Inc. (TMGU.OB), a Rancho Santa Margarita, California-based firm whose shares are traded on the NASD's over-the-counter bulletin board.

On June 15, Trinity said it had presented data at a scientific meeting in Toulon, France, that suggested the drug was safe and indicated nearly two-thirds of HIV (news - web sites)-infected patients could derive some benefit from Remune as the sole treatment for HIV.

But Trinity has not yet unveiled any data about survival trends among patients in the trial, which to-date has lasted 132 weeks and still includes 223 patients of 297 from an original study group. Nor has Trinity detailed whether levels of the HIV virus (news - web sites) have declined in the study group.

Remune, which is injected every three months, is made from a deactivated HIV virus that has been stripped of its so-called gp120-protein coat. The drug is designed to rebuild the immune systems of HIV-infected patients.

While Immune Response shares were being beaten down on Friday, Pfizer's shares were up rose 27 cents, or 0.68 percent, to $40.03 in afternoon trading on the New York Stock Exchange