St. John’s Wort cancer treatment heads to Phase III trial

Hy Biopharma cancer treatment heads to Phase III trial

The company developed a cancer drug based on a substance found in St. John’s Wort.

Gali Weinreb

US-Israeli start-up Hy Biopharma Inc., which has been almost anonymous in the local market until now, announced that it plans to shortly begin Phase III clinical trials of its cancer drug. The company’s product, HBP-347, is based on patents held by the Weizmann Institute of Science and New York University (NYU) and based on hypericin.

Hy Biopharma science advisory board director Dr. Gad Lavie, who invented the company’s technology, said that the company had kept a low profile because the product was brought through to the Phase II clinical trial by a US company, Vimerex, which no longer exists.