TuHURA Biosciences announced that the US Food and Drug Administration's (FDA) Office of Orphan Products Development has granted Orphan Drug Designation (ODD) to IFx-2.0 for the treatment of stage IIB to stage IV cutaneous melanoma.

The ODD designation was based on data from the company's previously completed phase-I study of IFx-2.0, results of which were published in the journal Molecular Therapeutics and entitled: "First-in-Human Stage II/IV Melanoma Clinical Trial of Immune Priming Agent IFx-Hu2.0," authored by Dr Joseph Markowitz, Department of Cutaneous Oncology, H Lee Moffitt Cancer Center and Research Institute. The study demonstrated IFx-Hu2.0 to be safe with no serious dose-limiting toxicities in addition to demonstrating that patients refractory to checkpoint inhibitor therapy (anti-PD1) experienced clinical benefit upon subsequent anti-PD1 based treatment.

Dr James Bianco, President and Chief Executive Officer, TuHURA Biosciences, said, "Our current focus with IFx-2.0 is targeting completion of enrollment in our phase-III study of IFx-2.0 in combination with Keytruda for the first-line treatment of advanced or metastatic Merkel Cell Carcinoma. We believe receiving ODD in advanced cutaneous melanoma demonstrates not only the significant need for new treatments in skin cancer, but also highlights IFx-2.0 as a potential new therapeutic approach in this patient population.”