Bellicum falls on T cell therapy U.S. trial holds

Bellicum Pharmaceuticals Inc. (NASDAQ:BLCM) fell $2.12 (26%) to $6.08 on Wednesday after it said FDA placed a clinical hold on U.S. trials of the company's adjunct, safety switch-containing T cell therapy BPX-501 in patients receiving partial match hematopoietic stem cell transplants (HSCTs). According to the company, FDA said three cases of reported encephalopathy were possibly related to the candidate. BPX-501 contains a rimiducid-activated CaspaCIDe safety switch intended to reduce T cell therapy-related toxicities by killing the engineered T cells following rimiducid administration.

Bellicum President and CEO Rick Fair told BioCentury that none of the three patients with encephalopathy had received rimiducid prior to presenting with the side effect. Fair said that encephalopathy improved in two of the three patients after receiving rimiducid, corticosteroids and other anti-infectives. The third patient was not treated with rimiducid and ultimately died. The patients were between 4 and 13 years of age with various diagnoses...