AURORA, Colo. - (Business Wire) CytoDyn, Inc. (Pink Sheets: CYDY), is pleased to announce the commencement of a contract with Aurora, Colorado-based Litchfield Enterprises, Inc. (LEI), a 12-year-old investor relations/corporate development firm. CytoDyn is best known for Cytolin®, its developmental phase immune therapy targeted at treating early stage HIV infection. LEI will publish information related to Cytolin’s studies being conducted at a major public teaching hospital in Boston, Massachusetts, and related corporate news as it becomes available for public distribution, among other activities. Mr. Allen D. Allen, CytoDyn’s CEO, commented, “LEI’s veteran financial industry team possesses an impressive track record. CytoDyn has reached a time in its business evolution whereby LEI’s proactive approach will serve us both from an investor and a public relations perspective. We believe one of the most efficacious ways to improve our overall standing is to have our story told to as many people as possible, in the shortest period of time possible. We believe LEI has the tools to do just that.”
LEI’s CEO, Mr. Patrick Moore, said, “As CytoDyn reemerges, it is precisely the type of company that is a good match with LEI’s collective skills, individual and institutional investor contacts across the U.S. and Europe. The timely story related to Cytolin® and CytoDyn’s corporate developments need to be communicated effectively to the investing community in order to gain and hold their interest. We are proud to represent a company that possesses such an important, promising treatment for HIV/AIDS.”
About CytoDyn, Inc.:
Cytolin® is a monoclonal antibody administered by intravenous infusion and might expand the standard of treatment. In preliminary clinical trials, and in compassionate use involving hundreds of patients treated for about two years, Cytolin®, produced encouraging results in delaying or reversing disease progression while acquiring a good safety record.
Significantly, Cytolin®, is not an antiviral drug although it has a significant, albeit indirect, antiviral effect (log reduction in viral burden). A first-in-class drug, Cytolin®, is designed to prevent the wholesale destruction of helpful CD4 T cells by a person's own killer T cells. The killer T cells are made by the human body in response to HIV infection as part of the natural defense against the virus. As first shown by Zarling, et al. in 1990 (Journal of Immunology, vol. 144, page 2992), the ability of these killer T cells to indiscriminately destroy CD4 T cells is a trait unique to humans, explaining why HIV infection does not cause disease in the other species the virus can infect. It has been known since the beginning of the AIDS pandemic that a wholesale loss of CD4 T cells is the reason why individuals infected with HIV become susceptible to the opportunistic infections and cancers that characterize AIDS. Up until the 1990s when three independent studies identified the killer T cells as the cause of the problem, the reason for the wholesale loss of CD4 cells remained a mystery because the virus infects relatively few CD4 T cells.
The fact that Cytolin®, has no direct effect on the life-cycle of the virus precludes the emergence of Cytolin-resistant virus due to the long-term use of Cytolin®,. This is in contrast to the antiviral drugs whose use promotes the evolution of drug-resistant virus. Consequently, a potential indication for Cytolin®, would be to administer it early in the infection in order to delay the natural progression of the disease and, therefore, the time when antiviral drugs become necessary. If so, healthcare providers could treat individuals infected with HIV more quickly, rather than spending years just watching and waiting.
Cytolin®, is the brainchild of scientist Allen D. Allen, the CEO of CytoDyn, which has been developing Cytolin®, as its lead product since the Company's inception in 2003. Notwithstanding CytoDyn's previous public discussions and efforts centered on other potential indications, the Company is now committed to developing Cytolin®, for the above indication; that is, as a mono therapy for treating early HIV infection before the antiviral drugs are indicated. The Company believes this best serves the needs of those infected with HIV and the physicians who treat them.
About Litchfield Enterprises, Inc.:
Litchfield Enterprises, Inc. was formed in May 1997 as a special opportunity investment entity. During the firm’s first three operational years, LEI’s principles discovered the micro- and small-cap companies with which they were working lacked investor relations programming with definable results. In 2000, LEI opened their own investor relations/corporate development division to fill that gap. The firm has been developing new approaches to investor relations, including the use of variable data marketing techniques, to be utilized via Internet, with email and direct mail projects, among other services. LEI’s team represents over 150 years collective financial industry experience including retail brokering; OTC and institutional trading; investment banking and syndication; sales management and brokerage operations.
Litchfield Enterprises, Inc.
Investor Relations
Mr. Patrick L. Moore, CEO, 800-416-8590
pat@litchfieldenterprisesinc.com
or
CytoDyn, Inc.
Ms. Corinne Allen, CFO, 505-988-5520
