Immutep Ltd (ASX:IMM) has reported a small-scale conceptual safety test among 49 patients using flagship drug IMP761 has seen no adverse effects.

Despite this, shares were down nearly -3% after twenty minutes of Tuesday trade. The data released by Immutep does not actually relate to patients with autoimmune diseases, but rather, healthy patients on whom iMP761 is being tested.

IMP761 is a LAG-3 agonist with that latter acronym referring to genes related to the human immune system. In many autoimmune conditions, the immune system goes ‘haywire’ and causes cancer – iMP761 attempts to go after one key type of immune system constituent to treat the targeted condition.

Among those conditions are arthritis, diabetes, and MS; in the past, Immutep has also studied cancers. Blood cancers are predominantly autoimmune, even if underlying mechanics are different between different types of cancer.

However, perhaps due to a lack of meaningful data on effectiveness against cancer, shareholders may be feeling impatient.

“We are very encouraged by the safety data generated to date for IMP761, the world’s first LAG-3 agonist antibody, in this Phase I setting,” Immutep CSO Dr. Frederic Triebel said.

“Derisking this promising asset in this proof-of-concept study in healthy subjects assessing its safety and immunosuppressive efficacy on an antigen-specific T-cell mediated intra-dermal reaction is an important step for this exciting program in autoimmune diseases.”

IMM last traded at 34cps.

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