Revive Therapeutics Ltd. announced that the FDA advised the Company to submit a Type C meeting request to discuss evaluating a proposed Phase 2 clinical study of Bucillamine, an oral thiol-based drug with anti-inflammatory and antiviral properties, as a potential treatment for long COVID. The Company expects to submit the Type C meeting request by next week. Currently, the Company is exploring the use of Bucillamine as a potential treatment for long COVID.

The Company is advancing the clinical development of Bucillamine by leveraging the published research and data from its previous Phase 3 clinical trial and is finalizing the regulatory and clinical package that includes a proposed Phase 2 clinical study for long COVID to present to the FDA. A study titled Thiol-based drugs decrease binding of SARS-CoV-2 spike protein to its receptor and inhibit SARS-CoV-2 cell entry showed that thiol-based drugs, like Bucillamine, decrease the binding of SARS-CoV-2 spike protein to its receptor, decrease the entry efficiency of SARS-CoV-2 spike pseudotyped virus, and inhibit SARS-CoV-2 live virus infection. These findings uncovered a vulnerability of SARS-CoV-2 to thiol-based drugs and provided a rationale to test thiol-based drugs such as Bucillamine as novel treatments for COVID-19.