OpGen Expands Partnership with New York State Department of Health and IDC to Detect Antimicrobial-Resistant Infections
June 03 2020 - 5:00AM
OpGen, Inc. (Nasdaq: OPGN) announced today that its strategic
collaboration with the New York State Department of Health (“DOH”)
to develop a state-of-the-art solution to detect, track, and manage
antimicrobial-resistant infections at healthcare institutions
statewide is entering into its second year expansion phase. Having
successfully achieved all of the milestones of the first year pilot
phase for the development of an infectious disease digital health
and precision medicine platform that connects healthcare
institutions to DOH and uses genomic microbiology for statewide
surveillance and control of antimicrobial resistance, OpGen will
continue to work together with DOH’s Wadsworth Center,
participating healthcare systems, and collaborators such as
Infectious Disease Connect, Inc. (IDC), which recently combined
with ILÚM Health Solutions, to expand the reach of the platform,
increase the volume of testing, and enhance data collection.
The DOH, OpGen, IDC and all stakeholders will
continue to work collaboratively to demonstrate that a sustainable,
flexible infectious diseases reporting, tracking and surveillance
tool for antimicrobial resistance can be applied across New York
State. The second-year expansion phase will build on the successes
and experience of the first year pilot phase while focusing on
accomplishing the goal of this visionary effort to improve patient
outcomes and save healthcare dollars by integrating real-time
epidemiologic surveillance with rapid delivery of antibiotic
resistance results to care-givers via web-based and mobile
platforms. OpGen is providing its Acuitas® AMR Gene Panel for rapid
detection of multidrug-resistant bacterial pathogens along with its
Acuitas Lighthouse® Software for high resolution pathogen tracking.
The second year contract includes a quarterly retainer-based
project fee as well as volume-dependent per test fees for a total
contract value of up to $450,000 to OpGen.
“We are excited and grateful that despite the
continued threat of the COVID-19 pandemic which has hit New York
State harder than any other place in the world, the Department of
Health of New York State and the Wadsworth Center continue to work
with us and have expanded their partnership for a second year,
adding up to 3,500 AMR Gene Panel tests to be run,” commented
Oliver Schacht, CEO of OpGen. “The quick spread of antimicrobial
resistant superbugs across our healthcare systems is lurking below
the current medical crisis. We anticipate that with our innovative
diagnostic solutions we will be able to proactively identify such
pathogens leading to early intervention and lifesaving treatment. A
further project expansion of this nature may include the
exploration of ways to achieve SARS-CoV-2 tracking.”
Paul Edwards, Chief Strategy Officer at IDC
commented, “Our collaboration with OpGen allows us to not only
identify bacteria and antimicrobial resistance down to the gene
level but also to identify new or significant results versus
phenotypic results alone. This molecular epidemiology capability in
turn is critical in order to rapidly identify new clusters and
outbreaks which otherwise would be missed and could potentially
lead to outbreaks of hospital superbugs.”
The precision medicine solutions provided by OpGen to accomplish
the project goals are:
- The OpGen Acuitas AMR Gene Panel, a
distributed, rapid diagnostics platform capable of detecting and
identifying multidrug-resistant bacterial pathogens in under three
hours and for use with the Acuitas Lighthouse Software. Together,
these products can help to rapidly identify and locate antibiotic
resistance threats in healthcare institutions and networks. Both
systems are commercially available for Research Use Only (RUO) and
the Acuitas AMR Gene Panel for use with bacterial isolates is
pending an expected near term FDA clearance decision.
- The OpGen Acuitas Lighthouse
Software includes Acuitas Lighthouse epidemiology dashboards with
high-resolution pathogen tracking through healthcare facilities, to
cities, regions, as well as the entire state.
Wadsworth Center Director Dr. Jill Taylor
said, "Under Governor Cuomo's leadership, New
York State continues to lead the nation in addressing the threat of
antimicrobial resistance. Working with our private-sector partners,
the Wadsworth Center is able to further advance our mission to
improve the public health of all New Yorkers.”
About Antimicrobial-resistant
InfectionsThe Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
estimates that annually in the United States we face 2.8 million
infections with 35,000 deaths and $49 billion in lost productivity
– all attributable to antibiotic resistant infections. Among the
infectious diseases the parties are working to address are
carbapenem-resistant Enterobacteriaceae (CRE) bacteria; they are
untreatable and hard-to-treat infections on the rise among patients
in medical facilities. CREs have become resistant to all or
nearly all the antibiotics we have today. Almost half of
hospital patients who get bloodstream infections from CRE bacteria
die from the infection. The CDC has classified CRE’s as one of
three urgent threats to the public health.
About Wadsworth Center
LaboratoriesThe Wadsworth Center laboratories stand at the
forefront of biomedical and environmental sciences and their
interplay. The Center serves a vital role in the New York State
Department of Health’s efforts to protect and promote the health of
New York’s citizens. Building on more than a century of excellence
as the state’s public health laboratory, the Center continues as a
premier biomedical institute that merges clinical and environmental
testing with fundamental, applied and translational research.
Today, Wadsworth Center scientists use both classical and
contemporary approaches to study environmental and biological
questions related to human health and disease. They develop
advanced methods to identify microbial or chemical threats; study
drug resistance, emerging infections, and environmental exposures;
manage the country’s most comprehensive diagnostic and
environmental testing laboratory permit program; oversee extramural
research programs on stem cells, breast cancer and spinal cord
injury; and train the next generation of scientists through
undergraduate, graduate, postdoctoral and visiting scientist
programs.
About OpGen Inc.
OpGen, Inc. (Gaithersburg, MD, USA) is a
precision medicine company harnessing the power of molecular
diagnostics and bioinformatics to help combat infectious disease.
Along with our subsidiaries, Curetis GmbH and Ares Genetics GmbH,
we are developing and commercializing molecular microbiology
solutions helping to guide clinicians with more rapid and
actionable information about life threatening infections to improve
patient outcomes, and decrease the spread of infections caused by
multidrug-resistant microorganisms, or MDROs. OpGen’s product
portfolio includes Unyvero, Acuitas AMR Gene Panel and Acuitas
Lighthouse, and the ARES Technology Platform including ARESdb,
using NGS technology and AI-powered bioinformatics solutions for
antibiotic response prediction.
For more information, please visit
www.opgen.com.
Forward-Looking Statements
This press release includes statements regarding
OpGen’s second year project phase with the New York State DOH.
These statements and other statements regarding OpGen’s future
plans and goals constitute "forward-looking statements" within the
meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933 and Section
21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 and are intended to
qualify for the safe harbor from liability established by the
Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Such statements
are subject to risks and uncertainties that are often difficult to
predict, are beyond our control, and which may cause results to
differ materially from expectations. Factors that could cause our
results to differ materially from those described include, but are
not limited to, our ability to successfully, timely and
cost-effectively develop, seek and obtain regulatory clearance for
and commercialize our product and services offerings, our ability
to successfully complete the second phase of the project with the
New York State DOH, the rate of adoption of our products and
services by hospitals and other healthcare providers, the
realization of expected benefits of our business combination
transaction with Curetis GmbH, the success of our commercialization
efforts, the impact of COVID-19 on the Company’s operations,
financial results, and commercialization efforts as well as on
capital markets and general economic conditions, the effect on our
business of existing and new regulatory requirements, and other
economic and competitive factors. For a discussion of the most
significant risks and uncertainties associated with OpGen's
business, please review our filings with the Securities and
Exchange Commission. You are cautioned not to place undue reliance
on these forward-looking statements, which are based on our
expectations as of the date of this press release and speak only as
of the date of this press release. We undertake no obligation to
publicly update or revise any forward-looking statement, whether as
a result of new information, future events or otherwise.
OpGen: Oliver Schacht President and CEO
InvestorRelations@opgen.com
OpGen Press Contact: Matthew Bretzius
FischTank PR matt@fischtankpr.com
OpGen Investor Contact: Joe Green Edison Group
jgreen@edisongroup.com
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