EG-009, one of the nine R&D pipelines of Shenzhen Evergreen Therapeutics Co., Ltd., will be used to treat the Cytokine Release Syndrome (CRS) triggered by the COVID-19. The total number of COVID-19 cases worldwide now stands at nearly 70 million, with more than 1.5 million deaths. CRS is a complex inflammatory response and is the leading cause of death for moderate to severe COVID-19. CRS can cause acute respiratory distress syndrome and multiple organ failure. In addition, many COVID-19 patients will have a secondary cytokine storm after being discharged from hospital. EG-009 can inhibit the activity of a variety of cytokines, so as to achieve the treatment of moderate/severe COVID-19 and reduce the mortality of patients.

At present, EG-009A injection, another COVID-19 treatment drug, is being planned by EG-009A for phase II clinical application. The IND and clinical protocol for this clinical trial have been formally approved by the FDA. The EG-009A injection will be used mainly in critically ill patients who need to be put on a ventilator immediately after admission. Having both oral and injectable candidates for moderate and severe COVID-19 will increase the clinical need and commercial value of EG-009.

"According to a report in Nature, there will be 150 million novel Coronavirus infected patients worldwide by June 2021," said Dr. Xin Du, CEO of Shenzhen Evergreen Therapeutics Co., Ltd., COVID-19 is emerging as the biggest epidemic facing humanity. Evergreen's mission is to develop drugs with urgent clinical needs, and we have been actively developing new COVID-19 drugs since the beginning of this year. Both of our drug candidates were developed under the FDA's CTAP program. The FDA took only 26 days to review the oral drugs and 29 days to review the injectable drugs. We thank the FDA for its effective review. Evergreen's new drug has entered clinical trials, which is an epoch-making milestone for us. It marks the transformation of Evergreen from early stage research and development to clinical stage pharmaceutical company. It is hoped that our candidate drugs will be developed successfully and contribute to reducing mortality among COVID-19 patients.