LucasBio’s immune cell therapy achieves complete recovery in severe Covid-19 patients

LucasBio, a Korean virus immunotherapy company, said that its proprietary immune cell therapy demonstrated the complete recovery of severe Covid-19 patients in a clinical study.

The findings were recently published in Clinical Infectious Diseases, the official journal of the Infectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA).

The study marks "the world’s first clinical case" in which a patient with prolonged Covid-19, previously lacking any effective treatment options, was cured using a therapy derived from the patient’s own T cells, LucasBio said.

The research, led by Professor Lee Rae-seok of the Department  Infectious Diseases at Seoul St. Mary’s Hospital, investigated the clinical efficacy and safety of autologous virus antigen-specific T-cell therapy in immunocompromised patients with severe Covid-19.

Such patients, including those with hematologic cancers, transplant recipients, individuals undergoing immunosuppressive therapy, and the elderly, often face poor outcomes despite antiviral drugs, leading to prolonged infection, severe pneumonia, or death.

In the study, three hematologic cancer patients suffering from severe Covid-19 pneumonia were treated with LucasBio’s virus antigen-specific T-cell therapy, LB-DTK-COV19.

As a result, all three patients showed clear therapeutic benefits, including viral clearance and resolution of pneumonia, resulting in a 100 percent cure rate.

LB-DTK-COV19 is a personalized precision therapy made by collecting a COVID-19 patient’s blood, isolating virus-specific memory T cells, expanding them ex vivo, and re-administering them. 

As the therapy is derived from the patient’s own T cells, follow-up monitoring confirmed long-term survival of these cells in the body and sustained immune response induction.

Building on these results, LucasBio said it is preparing to seek approval for its treatment plan under Korea’s Advanced Regenerative Bio Act within this year. With recent Covid-19 resurgence and concerns over potential future pandemics such as avian influenza, the company noted that its LB-DTK platform technology could be applied to a broad range of emerging and mutating viruses.