SUCCESSFUL
RESEARCH GIVES ENACT POTENTIAL NEW ORGANOMETALLIC ANTI-CANCER PRODUCTS
...discovery
brings hope for patients resistant to Platinum based drugs...
3rd
October 2002. Enact
Pharma plc ("Enact"), the market driven biopharmaceutical
company is pleased to announce that as a result of its ongoing successful
collaboration with the University of Leeds, a second patent describing
titanium-based organometallic compounds has been filed.
The
initial patent described the straightforward synthesis of novel water
soluble, but stable, titanium compounds. This second patent describes the
use of such compounds as anti-tumour drugs. The compounds described
exhibit excellent cytotoxicity against a number of different human tumour
cell lines including Cisplatin- resistant cell lines. These compounds have
directly addressed and overcome the problems of water insolubility and
instability normally associated with transition metal metallocenes.
Importantly, Enact's new compounds are fully active against tumour cell
lines that are resistant to platinum drugs.
Platinum-based
cancer treatments, such as Cisplatin, represent a market segment with a
value of about £1bn. However, their effectiveness is limited by toxicity
and the development of drug resistance. Furthermore, many cancers do not
respond to these agents because of intrinsic resistance. Thus, there is a
large un-met clinical need and resulting market for new agents active in
both these types of tumour. It is this need that Enact's new titanocene
compounds are designed to address.
Enact's
new titanocene compounds could, for example, help thousands of patients
with ovarian cancer. Over 80 percent of women with ovarian cancer
relapse after the first treatment, and, in the majority of these, the
tumour has developed resistance to the platinum therapy. Furthermore,
fifty percent of all ovarian cancers do not respond to these agents at all
because of an innate resistance to platinum-based drugs. Ovarian
cancer is the fourth most common cancer among women in the UK and there
are nearly 7000 new cases each year.
Prof.
Tony Atkinson, CEO of Enact Pharma commented, "Although
platinum-based drugs such as Cisplatin are excellent anti-tumour agents,
their use is often limited by drug resistance. New compounds that can
overcome this problem are needed. Our initial results are very exciting
and I look forward to putting our titanocene agents into
development."
-ends-
For
Further Information
Scott
Learmouth/Mel Choi
WMC Communications ltd
Tel: +44 (0) 2075913999
Email:
melissa.choi@wmccommunications.com
Notes
to the editor:
Background
Information
Cancer
is typically treated with surgery, radiation, chemotherapy, immunotherapy,
and/or gene therapy. While surgery and radiation are ideally used for
isolated tumors whose cells have not spread throughout the body, cancer
that has spread into other parts
of the body is usually treated with one or more of the other three
options. One widely used chemotherapeutic agent is cisplatin, especially
for testicular, bladder, germ cell, head and neck, small cell lung cancer,
and ovarian cancer.
Over 80 percent
of patients with ovarian cancer relapse after the first treatment, and a
majority of these develop resistance to the chemotherapy. Five year
survival rates for women diagnosed with this type of cancer for stages I,
II, III, and IV are 74, 58, 30, and 19 percent, respectively. This would
not be bad except for the fact that 74 percent of women with ovarian
cancer are diagnosed in stages III and IV. The initial response rates to
chemotherapy (usually cisplatin-based) are high; cisplatin resistance is
the reason for the low survival rates. It is the limiting factor in
chemotherapy treatment of ovarian cancer. Fifty percent of all ovarian
cancers are intrinsically resistant to cisplatin (having never been
treated), so a woman diagnosed with ovarian cancer has a fifty percent
chance of even responding to the chemotherapy.*
*Information
taken from Shelly Jozwiak Kellogg 'Finding a Way to Treat Cisplatin and
Multiple Drug- Resistant Cancers'; www.honors.sbc.edu/jozwiakkellogg.htm
About
Enact:
Enact
Pharma is an emerging biopharmaceutical company. An OFEX listed company,
Enact Pharma has focused on the research and development of anti-cancer
therapies and other products for the treatment of neuropathological
diseases. Enact is the result of a merger in April 2000 between Enzacta
and Kymed. The Company is based in the UK, with a research and development
facility at Porton Down near Salisbury, and offices at Salisbury and
Heyford Park.
Enact's
strengths are a committed management and scientific team, a strong product
portfolio, which has now been developed and validated to enter clinical
trials, and its ability to both identify and create commercial
opportunity. The Company is now in a position to proceed independently to
a Phase I trial of its lead product NQ02. The NQ02 clinical trial will
create the first major step increase in company value and initiate a
significant revenue flow to develop the Company's rich product portfolio.
Mel
Choi Senior
Account Manager
WMC
Communications
7 Cheval Place
London SW7 IEW
Ph:
+44 (0)207 591 3999
Fax: +44 (0)207 591 3910
www.wmccommunications.com
