more press for nabi - from todays NYT business section:
Patents: Can Vaccine Prevent Addiction to Smoking?
By SABRA CHARTRAND
Millions of Americans smoke, and many of them battle nicotine addiction with the often frustrating and limited assistance of nicotine chewing gums and skin patches.
A Maryland biopharmaceutical company has won a patent for what it calls a nicotine vaccine. It says the drug can block nicotine from reaching the brain and triggering the "feel good" chemicals that cause people to light up again and again until they are addicted.
The Nabi Corporation in Rockville acknowledges that its method is unproved in humans. It says studies on animals have shown no side effects, but clinical trials with people will begin only early next year with a grant from the National Institutes of Health.
The medical and monetary potential is substantial if the drug is successful, since it could make it possible for those struggling to quit smoking to have a cigarette, cigar or pipe without reawakening their addiction. But on the other hand, the same people — along with many nonsmokers — might also think they could smoke without worrying about addiction, which would do nothing to address the harmful effects of cigarette smoke on the lungs.
Dr. Robert Naso, a senior vice president for product development at Nabi and one of the inventors, said inhaling smoke was not the reason most people used tobacco.
"It's really the nicotine hit that drives the smoker to smoke," he explained. "You have to eliminate that driver, the desire for that hit."
He said the technology would not stop people from smoking, but it might "immunize" people who have not really started.
"It might keep teenagers who want to look cool at a Saturday night party from becoming addicted to nicotine and turning into two- pack-a-day smokers," he said
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