Oncimmune Holdings (ONC ) said data from a trial aimed at detecting lung cancer early has supported the trend towards a mortality benefit of Oncimmune’s EarlyCDT Lung blood test.  

Today, the Company highlighted follow-up data for the Early detection of Cancer of the Lung Scotland ("ECLS") trial in medRxiv, 'Targeted screening for lung cancer with autoantibodies'.  

The pre-publication shows that after three years, the number of late-stage cancers and deaths were lower in patients tested with the EarlyCDT Lung blood test. ‘Crucially, all cause mortality as well as cancer specific and lung cancer mortality was reduced,’ Oncimmune said. 

The ECLS trial, believed to be the largest randomised controlled trial for detecting cancer using blood-based biomarkers, was published last year in 'Earlier diagnosis of lung cancer in a randomised trial of an autoantibody blood test followed by imaging' in the European Respiratory Journal and showed a 36% reduction in late-stage diagnoses of lung cancer.  

Oncimmune said the results from the trial also indicated a lower rate of all deaths and lung cancer-related deaths among people in the intervention arm of the trial after two years compared with people in the control group suggesting that the EarlyCDT Lung blood test followed by computerised tomography (CT) imaging could produce a mortality benefit. 

The follow-up data supports a continued trend towards a reduction in mortality while it also showed that autoantibodies detected by Oncimmune’s EarlyCDT Lung blood test are both ‘specific and most sensitive’ for early-stage disease in the first year after testing, with lung cancers detected by the EarlyCDT Lung test detected mainly at an early stage, it noted. 

In Scotland, lung cancer affects more than 5,000 people annually of which around 4,000 will die of the disease, usually due to the diagnosis being made too late for curative treatment.  

Earlier diagnosis means that more patients should benefit from newer, more effective, chemotherapy, surgery, and radiotherapy, therefore, reducing the impact of this disease.  

Dr Adam M Hill, CEO of Oncimmune said: "The key to cancer survival is early detection. With thousands fewer patients being referred for lung cancer tests since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic, the early detection of lung cancer has never been more important.  

Commenting on the pre-published data, Hill stated, “This paper demonstrates the impact a simple blood test in combination with volumetric imaging can have on cancer mortality. Cancer specific mortality was significantly lower in those tested with EarlyCDT Lung.” 

“Assuming the three-year survival from lung cancer is 80% in those tested, this would suggest 472 people need to to be tested in order to save one life, which is comparable with other established, and widely available screening programmes for other cancers,” he added. 

Looking ahead, Oncimmune noted that follow-up analyses will be performed on what it has described to shareholders as a ‘unique, globally significant cohort’ after five and ten years. 

The Company said it is “encouraging” to see the data generated for the EarlyCDT Lung blood test which provides further evidence in support of its adoption and that it is currently in ongoing discussions to this end with healthcare providers across the UK and further afield. 

View from Vox 

In June 2021, in an update for the year ended 31 May 2021, Oncimmune said it had delivered “outstanding top line growth” as FY21 revenues saw a more than eightfold increase on FY20.   

Oncimmune successfully completed an equity placing in March 2021, raising £9m to provide additional funding to increase its ImmunoINSIGHTS commercial team headcount, principally in the US, and to increase its operational capacity at its lab facility in Dortmund, Germany.   

To date, the company said its programme to increase capacity to approximately 40,000 samples per annum by Q1 FY23, is ‘proceeding to plan’ and will enable the Company to meet the increasing the demand from customers for its ImmunoINSIGHTS service offering.    

In particular, Oncimmune said its ImmunoINSIGHTS offering has emerged through the global pandemic in FY21 ‘as a robust and resilient growth engine for the Company,’   

Oncimmune said it expects to sign new contracts in 1Q22 from its ImmunoINSIGHTS pipeline  which, together with those contracts already signed in FY21, is expected to deliver revenue of around 50% of the FY22 market expectations for the ImmunoINSIGHTS business.   

The company believes that the ImmunoINSIGHTS business, which has a current pipeline of over 100 separate opportunities, is now in a solid position to deliver ‘sustainable growth.’   

Reasons to  ONC

Oncimmune Holdings’ focus is to harness the immune system’s sophisticated response to disease to detect cancer earlier and to support the development of better therapies.   

Leading Proprietary Technology Portfolio   

The company believes the key to improving cancer survival is early detection and optimal selection for therapy. Oncimmune's immuno-diagnostic test, EarlyCDT, can detect and help identify cancer on average four years earlier than standard clinical diagnosis.   

Oncimmune’s core technology also powers its ImmunoINSIGHTS service; a proprietary platform that enables life-science organisations to optimise drug development and delivery, leading to more effective, targeted as well as safer treatments for patients.   

The group’s EarlyCDT Lung blood test was previously featured on an ITV news broadcast last weekend titled ‘New Blood Test Provides Breakthrough in Lung Cancer Detection Rates’.    

The feature highlighted that, in the UK, more than 35,000 people die of lung cancer each year and most have their lung cancer diagnosed late thereby lowering their chances of survival. 80% of lung cancer cases are diagnosed in the latest stages of the disease.    

The EarlyCDT test works to identify the immune system's response to the presence of lung cancer. The test detects antibodies present in the body, enabling clinicians to focus their diagnosis on identifying the disease and treating it earlier than current clinical practice.    

It has previously been shown that Oncimmune’s EarlyCDT Lung blood test can detect lung cancer on average four years before standard of care and has shown in a large National Health Service (NHS) trial that it can reduce late stage lung cancer presentation by 36%.   

Inflection Point to Commercialisation   

The Company now believes it has made the point of inflection as it matures from an R&D business into a commercial entity evidenced through its deepening commercial relationships with Industry Partners such as Roche   

Fully Funded   

The Company is now fully funded to develop all its commercial activities and drive revenues.   

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