Kicking off with non-opioid drugs news, Latigo Biotherapeutics have just announced $135 million in Series A financing to develop non-opioid medicines for patients suffering from acute and chronic pain​​. Since launching in 2020, the company has been working on a portfolio of novel pain therapeutics, focusing on drugs that use a selective Nav1.8 inhibitor to block pain receptors.

Nav1.8 belongs to a family of voltage-gated sodium channels primarily found in the peripheral nervous system, especially in the pain-sensing neurons known as nociceptors. By inhibiting this sodium channel, new drugs can target and prevent the transmission of pain signals from the peripheral sites of injury or inflammation to the central nervous system.

Similarly utilizing Nav1.8 inhibitors for pain management is Vertex, who recently announced success in a Phase 3 study of VX-548 - a selective Nav1.8 inhibitor for the treatment of painful diabetic peripheral neuropathy. Study results demonstrated that the treatment led to significant reductions in pain intensity, and was well tolerated by patients. The company is planning to submit an NDA to the FDA by mid-2024.

Signposting moves to halt the spread of misuse, the UK’s MHRA has just announced that codeine linctus, an over-the-counter opioid-based oral solution or syrup to treat dry cough in adults, is to immediately be reclassified as a prescription-only medicine due to increasing reports that it is being misused as an ingredient in a recreational drink.

And while non-opioid-based medications carry the promise of decreasing opioid dependence, there remains an urgent requirement to tackle opioid overdose when it happens.

Harm Reduction Therapeutics (HRT) are a nonprofit pharmaceutical company founded to save lives by making the anti-opioid drug, naloxone, available over-the-counter free of charge, or at the lowest possible cost. Following the FDA’s approval of its OTC RiVive™ (naloxone HCl nasal spray) for the emergency treatment of opioid overdose, the company says it is advancing its manufacturing with the goal of making shipments early this year.