NuCana Provides Update on Impact of COVID-19 on Clinical Studies

EDINBURGH, United Kingdom, April 02, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- NuCana plc (NASDAQ: NCNA) has been closely monitoring the potential impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on its operations and announced today an update on the status of its ongoing clinical studies.  In order to help to protect the health of patients and investigators at its clinical study sites, the enrollment of new patients in its ongoing clinical studies has been temporarily paused.  Patients who are currently enrolled in NuCana’s ongoing studies are continuing to receive treatment. 

“This pandemic has dramatically impacted the global healthcare delivery system and altered the landscape not only for NuCana, but also for the wider biotech industry and society as a whole,” said Hugh S. Griffith, NuCana’s CEO. “This temporary pause in enrollment of new patients will help to ease the burden on our study sites and enable healthcare professionals to focus their efforts on caring for patients with COVID-19. We have also adapted ongoing studies to reduce the risk of exposure to the coronavirus by minimizing the time patients need to be in the hospital for study visits.”

While NuCana continues to evaluate the impact of COVID-19 on its operations, the company believes that this pandemic will inevitably cause some delays to the timing of initiation and completion of its clinical studies. However, the precise timing of delays and overall impact is currently unknown and NuCana is continuing to monitor the COVID-19 pandemic as it rapidly evolves.

Mr. Griffith concluded: “We remain committed to resuming the enrollment of new patients as quickly as possible. I am confident that NuCana has the resources and resolve to navigate this pandemic.”  

About NuCana plc

NuCana is a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company focused on significantly improving treatment outcomes for cancer patients by applying our ProTide technology to transform some of the most widely prescribed chemotherapy agents, nucleoside analogs, into more effective and safer medicines. While these conventional agents remain part of the standard of care for the treatment of many solid and hematological tumors, their efficacy is limited by cancer cell resistance mechanisms and they are often poorly tolerated. Utilizing our proprietary technology, we are developing new medicines, ProTides, designed to overcome key cancer resistance mechanisms and generate much higher concentrations of anti-cancer metabolites in cancer cells. Our most advanced ProTide candidates, Acelarin and NUC-3373, are new chemical entities derived from the nucleoside analogs gemcitabine and 5-fluorouracil, respectively, two widely used chemotherapy agents. Acelarin is currently being evaluated in four clinical studies, including a Phase III study for patients with biliary tract cancer, a Phase Ib study for patients with biliary tract cancer, a Phase II study for patients with platinum-resistant ovarian cancer and a Phase III study for patients with metastatic pancreatic cancer for which enrollment has been suspended. NUC-3373 is currently in a Phase I study for the potential treatment of a wide range of advanced solid tumors and a Phase Ib study for patients with previously treated metastatic colorectal cancer. Our third ProTide, NUC-7738, is a transformation of a novel nucleoside analog (3’-deoxyadenosine) and is in a Phase I study for patients with advanced solid tumors.

Forward-Looking Statements

This press release may contain “forward‐looking” statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 that are based on the beliefs and assumptions and on information currently available to management of NuCana plc (the “Company”). All statements other than statements of historical fact contained in this press release are forward-looking statements, including statements concerning the Company’s planned and ongoing clinical studies for the Company’s product candidates and the potential advantages of those product candidates, including Acelarin, NUC-3373 and NUC-7738; the initiation, enrollment, timing, progress, release of data from and results of those planned and ongoing clinical studies; the impact of COVID-19 on its preclinical studies, clinical studies, business, financial condition and results of operations; and the utility of prior non-clinical and clinical data in determining future clinical results. In some cases, you can identify forward-looking statements by terminology such as “may,” “will,” “should,” “expects,” “plans,” “anticipates,” “believes,” “estimates,” “predicts,” “potential” or “continue” or the negative of these terms or other comparable terminology. Forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause the Company’s actual results, performance or achievements to be materially different from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by the forward-looking statements. These risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to, the risks and uncertainties set forth in the "Risk Factors" section of the Company’s Annual Report on Form 20-F for the year ended December 31, 2019 filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) on March 10, 2020, and subsequent reports that the Company files with the SEC. Forward-looking statements represent the Company’s beliefs and assumptions only as of the date of this press release. Although the Company believes that the expectations reflected in the forward-looking statements are reasonable, it cannot guarantee future results, levels of activity, performance or achievements. Except as required by law, the Company assumes no obligation to publicly update any forward‐looking statements for any reason after the date of this press release to conform any of the forward-looking statements to actual results or to changes in its expectations.

For more information, please contact:

NuCana plc

Hugh S. Griffith

Chief Executive Officer

1

Westwicke, an ICR Company

Chris Brinzey

RooneyPartners

Marion Janic