UPDATE 2-Seelos Therapeutics' ALS treatment fails mid-stage study

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March 19 (Reuters) - Seelos Therapeutics' experimental ALS drug did not meet the main goal of a mid-stage trial, the company said on Tuesday, the latest study setback in a field littered with clinical failures.

Shares of the New York-based company plunged about 52% to 44 cents, hitting a record low.

The drug, SLS-005, when tested in 120 patients, failed to show statistically significant improvement in motor function and reducing mortality in patients with ALS, or amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, versus a placebo.

The company said it would discuss the next steps with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, and plans to conduct more analyses of the trial when it receives the full dataset. It said the drug showed a "potential signal for efficacy" in the study.

ALS affects 16,000 to 32,000 people in the United States, and has long eluded researchers searching for an effective treatment.

Still, the FDA has approved a handful of drugs in recent years such as Biogen's Qalsody and Amylyx Pharmaceuticals' Relyvrio.

"We believe the observed signal and success probability is competitive to other recently FDA-approved therapies for ALS, which also failed to achieve statistical significance," said Seelos CEO Raj Mehra.

Earlier this month Amylyx said it is considering withdrawing Relyvrio from the market after the drug failed to slow disease progression in a late-stage trial.

Other recent setbacks in the ALS drug development space include Denali Therapeutics' and partner Sanofi's trial failure, and Brainstorm Cell Therapeutics' treatment getting a negative vote from the FDA's advisers.

ALS is a rare disease that can affect nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord responsible for muscle movements, leading to progressive paralysis and death. (Reporting by Christy Santhosh; Editing by Savio D'Souza and Shailesh Kuber)