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Siga Technologies said that it had received orders worth about $13 million for its oral smallpox drug that it expects to be used to treat monkeypox as cases spread globally.
Shares of the drugmaker jumped 9 percent on the news of the orders that come at a time when more than 3,000 confirmed cases of monkeypox have been reported from 40 countries where the disease is not endemic.
The World Health Organization will decide whether to declare monkeypox a global health emergency, stirring criticism from leading African scientists who say it has been a crisis in their region for years.
Monkeypox is a viral disease that causes flu-like symptoms and skin lesions and is endemic in parts of Africa.
Siga’s drug, Tpoxx, is approved in the European Union to treat diseases caused by the family of orthopoxvirus that includes smallpox, monkeypox, and cowpox, while it is only approved to treat smallpox in the United States and Canada.
The orders include $11 million worth initial procurement from two new countries in Europe and Asia Pacific and another $2 million from a country in the Asia Pacific region which has an established contract for the drug, Siga said.
Siga plans to deliver about $4 million of oral Tpoxx under the two new contracts within the next 45 days, with the remaining order expected to be sent next year.
“We expect a portion of the courses of oral Tpoxx delivered under these orders will be used for the treatment of active monkeypox cases and represent a first step in the response to this outbreak by the global public health community,” Siga chief executive officer Phil Gomez said.
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