NEWS: Selective Immune supressive on T Cells rather than GENERALLY IMMUNE SUPPRESSIVE!:
Inflazyme Pharmaceuticals Ltd -
Inflazyme selects IPL423,323 as new treatment of psoriasis
Inflazyme Pharmaceuticals Ltd IZP
Shares issued 44,379,628 1999-09-22 close $1.5
Thursday Sep 23 1999
Mr. Ian McBeath reports
Inflazyme Pharmaceuticals has selected IPL423,323 as the lead compound from its IPL423 series as a potential new treatment of psoriasis and organ transplant rejection.
Ian McBeath, Inflazyme's president and chief executive officer, said IPL423,323 has demonstrated in animal models that it is as effective as cyclosporin, the current standard treatment for inhibition of organ transplant rejection, without suppressing the body's entire immune system as occurs with cyclosporin. Cyclosporin is also commonly used as a treatment for psoriasis.
"These results -- together with preliminary data, which indicate other compounds from the our IPL423 series have potential for the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis and inflammatory bowel disease - confirm that we are on course to meeting our goal of having one or more molecules from this series entering human clinical trials before the end of the year 2000," said Mr. McBeath. "We are pleased to be able to bring into development another potentially significant new anti-inflammatory compound from our in-house research."
Dr. Stephen Chung, transplant surgeon and research investigator at Vancouver Hospital and Health Sciences Centre, who is working with the Inflazyme team of researchers, said: "These data are quite positive and suggest that Inflazyme's IPL423,323 may be effective in the prevention of organ transplant rejection without being globally immunosuppressive. A drug having the ability to selectively inhibit cells responsible for rejection and providing efficacy comparable to cyclosporin would be a major breakthrough."
Dr. David Burgoyne, Inflazyme's vice-president of research, said IPL423,323 demonstrated equivalent graph survival compared to cyclosporin in an animal allograft transplantation model. "Activity in in vivo (animal) models of transplant rejection is considered predictive of clinical efficacy in psoriasis based on a similarity in the basis of the autoimmune component of graft rejection and psoriasis," said Dr. Burgoyne.
"Average time to graft rejection was 8.5 days in the untreated group, 13.5 days in the cyclosporin treated group and 15.4 days in the IPL423,323 treated group. These data demonstrating activity comparable to cyclosporin in this model support our decision to develop IPL423,323 for both the prevention of organ transplant rejection and psoriasis."
Additional laboratory studies have demonstrated that IPL423,323 is selective for T-cell types associated with graft rejection and psoriasis. This indicates that IPL423,323, unlike cyclosporin, may not be generally immunosuppressive, Dr. Burgoyne said.
Organ transplant rejection occurs when cells of the recipient's immune system see the donor tissue as foreign and react by expressing various inflammatory mediators in order to reject the donor tissue. In 1997, the North American market for the prevention of organ transplant rejection was in excess of $1-billion.
Psoriasis is a common, chronic inflammatory skin disease characterized by raised, inflamed, thickened and scaly lesions that itch, burn, sting and bleed easily. Psoriasis is estimated to affect over six million people in North America, with between 150,000 and 250,000 new cases diagnosed each year.
IPL423 is Inflazyme's second series of small molecule anti-inflammatory compounds. The IPL423 series was synthesized from a molecule originally isolated from a plant source indigenous to British Columbia. Inflazyme has previously demonstrated molecules from the IPL423 series to be inhibitors of inflammation in vivo with a profile suggesting limited potential for side effects.
WARNING: The company relies upon litigation protection for "forward-looking" statements.
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