BIOTECH FIRM SAYS VACCINE COULD HELP TO BEAT COCAINE ADDICTION

A vaccine to help wean addicts off cocaine has passed early stage clinical
trials, according to its UK developers, Cantab Pharmaceuticals.

The Cambridge-based biotech company said its anti-cocaine vaccine, called
TA-CD, had shown encouraging safety and tolerance levels in phase one trials
with 34 patients.

Cantab hopes its product could eventually target more than two million
regular cocaine users in the US and the UK.

In the US, around 900,000 users seek treatment each year, in Scotland 186
people sought treatment for cocaine problems in 1997/98.

TA-CD would be used in drug rehabilitation centres alongside behavioural
programmes, currently the only kind of therapy available.

Patients are injected with a cocaine derivative and another chemical element
designed to "turbo-boost" the immune system. The product also includes a
protein which carries the drug in the blood stream and enlarges the
molecules of cocaine, which are normally too small to be detected by the
antibody defence system.

Antibodies are then stimulated to attack the cocaine, interfere with its
transport through the bloodstream and neutralise its effect on the brain.

Melissa Hellberg, vice-president in charge of investor and media relations
at Cantab Pharmaceuticals, said: "We're using the immune system to target
the cocaine in the same way it would target any other foreign molecule, like
a virus or bacteria. At the moment the trouble is that when people take
cocaine on its own, the molecule is too small to be seen by the immune
system and therefore you can't raise an antibody response to it.

"TA-CD represents potentially the first [pharmaceutical therapy] that could
be used alongside behavioural therapy to help in a very serious condition
for which there is currently no [pharmaceutical] alternative."

Cantab said all 34 patients in its initial trials, carried out at a drug
rehabilitation centre in New England, showed an antibody response to the
vaccine which lasted for at least 84 days.

The phase one trials were funded by the US National Institute on Drug Abuse
(NIDA), one of the government's National Institutes of Health.

NIDA is also expected to help fund Cantab's phase two trials, which will
involve between 100 and 300 patients and will also take place in the US.

If ongoing trials run smoothly and there are no regulatory hitches, the
anti-cocaine vaccine could be on the market in 2004, the company said.

Cantab, which has yet to bring a product to market, is also working on an
anti-nicotine vaccine, which would work on the same principles as TA-CD. Its
development is about a year behind the cocaine product but should start
initial phase one trials in the second half of the year.

The company also has partnerships with SmithKline Beecham and Glaxo Wellcome
to develop vaccine therapies for genital warts and genital herpes, respectively.

In 1997, Cantab formed a joint venture with the charity Marie Curie Cancer
Care to develop treatments for cervical cancer.

Cantab Pharmaceuticals was established in 1989 by the former head of
immunology at Cambridge University, Alan Munro.

In the three months to 31 March 1999 it had a cash balance of UKP30.8
million against a net loss of UKP1.8 million.