Veru Announces Nature Medicine Publication Demonstrating that Enobosarm, an Androgen Receptor Targeted Agent, Inhibits Hormone Receptor Positive Metastatic Breast Cancer that has Become Resistant to Estrogen Receptor Targeted Endocrine and CDK4/6 Inhibito

--International Study Establishes the Role of Androgen Receptor as a Tumor Suppressor in ER+ Advanced Breast Cancer--

--Preclinical Studies Support Enobosarm’s Novel Mechanism of Action as an AR Activating Agent as a Potential Therapy in Patients with ER+ Metastatic Breast Cancer that have Become Resistant to Current Standard of Care Treatments--

--Veru Also Announces that the Enobosarm Phase 3 Registration ARTEST Study is on Track to Commence Next Quarter in Patients with Metastatic ER+ Breast Cancer that is Resistant to Estrogen Receptor Targeted Endocrine Therapy and CDK4/6 Inhibitors--

MIAMI, Jan. 19, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Veru Inc. (NASDAQ: VERU), an oncology biopharmaceutical company with a focus on developing novel medicines for the management of prostate and breast cancer, today announced the online publication of an article in Nature Medicine, Volume 27, Issue 2, February, 2021, entitled: “The Androgen Receptor is a Tumor Suppressor in Estrogen Receptor-Positive Breast Cancer” (https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-020-01168-7 or DOI # 10.1038/s41591-020-01168-7) by an international team headed by Drs. Theresa Hickey and Wayne Tilley at the University of Adelaide in collaboration with scientists at the Garvan Institute of Medical Research in Australia.

In the Nature Medicine publication, Dr. Hickey and colleagues provide scientific evidence supporting a new discovery in breast cancer demonstrating that the androgen receptor acts like a tumor suppressor. Using human cell line and patient derived breast cancer models, they demonstrate that androgen receptor activation by androgens and enobosarm, a selective androgen receptor agonist, had potent antitumor activity in all ER positive breast cancer preclinical models tested including those that have become resistant to estrogen receptor targeted endocrine therapy as well as CDK 4/6 inhibitors, which are standard of care treatments for advanced, ER+ breast cancer. Further, enobosarm, by activating the androgen receptor, has demonstrated antitumor activity in both estrogen receptor targeted endocrine therapy resistant and CDK4/6 inhibitor resistant metastatic human breast cancer models. In contrast, androgen receptor inhibitors, like enzalutamide, had no effect. This study clears up the confusion in the scientific field regarding the role that the androgen receptor is playing in ER+ breast cancer.