Interesting Story regarding new drug.

A Danish drug tested in San Antonio chimpanzees is showing promise as a new gene-based therapy that fights hepatitis C and potentially other diseases.

The drug, developed by biopharmaceutical firm Santaris Pharma A/S, doesn't directly fight the virus, which is quick to develop drug resistance.

Instead, it targets and locks down a gene in the liver that the virus needs in order to replicate, said Robert Lanford of the Southwest Foundation for Biomedical Research.

“The high barrier to resistance makes it one of the most attractive drugs we've seen,” said Lanford, lead author on the study, which appears in Thursday's issue of Science Express.

An estimated 3.2 million people in the United States have hepatitis C, or HCV, and many don't know it, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It can range from a mild illness lasting a few weeks to a lifelong disease that may not become apparent for years, and can lead to cirrhosis or liver cancer.

Santaris' “locked nucleic acid” technology uses a DNA-based drug called SPC3649. It was given to four chimpanzees at the Southwest Foundation that were infected with chronic hepatitis C virus.

The two chimpanzees that received higher doses of SPC3649 had a 350-fold drop in the viral levels in the blood and liver, Lanford said.

The animals, the only other creatures besides humans that can be infected with HCV, were given one dose a week for 12 weeks. Not only did they not develop resistance to the drug, which usually happens within days, Lanford said, but the virus stayed suppressed for several months after researchers stopped the therapy.

“Not only did we knock down the virus, but we saw an improvement in the liver itself, because we could keep the virus down so long,” he said.

It's also a promising platform for gene therapy, a technology that has been frustrating scientists for some time, Lanford said.

Normally, DNA-based drugs are not stable in the body, he said. “They get degraded in the body and they just don't bind as well” to the gene involved.

Releasing the drug is still several years off. It has moved into Phase I trials in healthy humans to see if there are other adverse effects, Lanford said, and then must go through two more phases of extensive testing in humans before it is approved.

Santaris contracted with Southwest Foundation for the preclinical trial because “we're one of the few places that has chimpanzees,” Lanford said.

[FlGuy]

http://www.clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT00979927?term=hepatitis+c+SPC3649&rank=1

It makes me wonder how the chimps got hcv in the first place.  CSWs, body piercing, rough sex, tattoos, IVDU (with those opposable thumbs)  - I wonder.  I think they have posted here before with questions.

[anafromtexas2]

Yeah - that is sad.

[DD9th]

Now, that is no fair, you made me laugh, and I'm supposed to be all depressed and angsty what with these sx.  (*laugh*)

To anafromtexas2:  That is very interesting, thanks for posting.  It may not effect me personally since I'm already doing the tx, (and I have every intention of reaching SVR!), but I am glad to hear that there may be alternatives to interferon tx.  

[Marcia2202]

The cruelty against chimps aside...

This drug sounds incredible. There are so many new drugs coming out at the moment, I'm very hopeful that in a few years no interferon will be needed anymore.

It seems it is really starting to happen. Can you imagine going through treatment without feeling like absolute crap, not getting thyroid problems or other long lasting side effects?