http://www.japantoday.com/e/?content=news&cat=8&id=75174
British firm tests world's first nicotine vaccine
Monday, September 10,
2001 at 09:30 JST
LONDON — A British biotechnology company, already developing a
vaccine to help addicts kick cocaine, said on Monday it had started clinical
trials on the world's first nicotine addiction vaccine.
The product, which is given by injection into the muscle, aims to prevent
the addictive cycle of cigarette smoking by stopping nicotine from entering the
brain.
However, the initial Phase I study of TA-NIC will merely assess its safety
and tolerability at different doses, and researchers still have several years
work ahead of them to prove the efficacy of the product.
David Oxlade, chief executive of Xenova Group Plc, the company behind the
project, said the vaccine could eventually have an important role to play in
helping smokers quit.
Currently available smoking cessation products include nicotine replacement
therapy, delivered via skin patches or chewing gum, as well as drugs like
GlaxoSmithKline Plc's Zyban.
TA-NIC and Xenova's anti-cocaine vaccine TA-CD work by generating antibodies
in the bloodstream that prevent nicotine and cocaine from crossing into the
brain, thereby blocking the normal "high" generated by the drugs.
Xenova has a total of eight products in clinical trials, the most valuable
of which is deemed to be XR 9576, designed to fight multi-drug resistant
cancer. Xenova struck a $105 million licensing deal for XR 9576 with
Vancouver-based QLT Inc last month. (Reuters News)
