 Akebia Therapeutics, Inc. Nasdaq: AKBA, a biopharmaceutical company with the purpose of bettering the lives of people impacted by kidney disease, today announced the initiation of an investigator-sponsored study evaluating the use of vadadustat, Akebias investigational oral hypoxia-inducible factor prolyl hydroxylase inhibitor HIF-PHI, as a potential therapy to prevent and lessen the severity of acute respiratory distress syndrome ARDS, a complication of COVID-19 infection. The study will be conducted by The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston UTHealth in Houston, Texas. Bentley J. Bobrow, MD, Chair of Emergency Medicine, and Holger K. Eltzschig, MD, PhD, Chair of the Department of Anesthesiology with McGovern Medical School at UTHealth, will serve as co-principal investigators of the study. 