IOMI Puts Patch on Traveler’s Woes « H E » MN1 Exclusive :: email posted Wednesday, 1 August 2007 Andrew Weinman MN1 Staff WriterNot every morning on the market starts with the top movers or the top earners. Sometimes it starts at the bottom.
Take one of this morning’s quickest movers on the Nasdaq. The Iomai Corporation (NASDAQ: IOMI) announced today that its patch-based vaccine for enterotoxigenic E. coli bacteria “conferred statistically significant protection” from traveler’s diarrhea, sending Iomai share prices up 10 percent after market open.
Despite the somewhat humorous nature of the disease behind Iomai’s latest news, ETEC can be a serious, if annoying problem. According to the Center of Disease Control’s Web site (www.cdc.gov), E. coli is a bacterium that normally lives in the intestines of humans and other animals, and that most types of E. coli are harmless, but some can cause disease. Enterotoxigenic E coli (ETEC), is the name given to a group of E. coli that produce special toxins which stimulate the lining of the intestines causing them to secrete excessive fluid, thus producing diarrhea. Often associated with poor sanitation and contaminated food and water – and thus, with countries with less stringent public health laws than the United States – ETEC is the proverbial tourist’s nightmare, turning what promised to be two weeks of paradise in the Bahamas into a two weeks of abdominal cramping, nausea, and being stuck on the toilet for hours on end.
Thankfully, that’s where Iomai’s little patch comes in. According to the company’s statement, travelers using the vaccine were 75 percent less likely to suffer moderate or severe diarrhea “from any cause” and were 84 percent less likely to be afflicted with severe diarrhea. In addition, the statement claimed that the vaccine actually lowered the frequency and duration of diarrhea in those subjects who did contract ETEC while vaccinated.
The company’s patch-based vaccine seems to have already attracted some attention. Herbert L. DuPont, M.D., professor and director at the Center for Infectious Diseases at the University of Texas’ School of Public Health, served as the principal investigator for the trial and was very impressed by what he saw.
“The results from this study strongly suggest that the use of Iomai’s needle-free, patch-based vaccine can have a notable impact in reducing the chances of suffering from the ravages of traveler’s diarrhea,” DuPont said in the statement. “Right now, we are generally limited to administering antibiotics after the illness has begun. An effective, easy-to-use vaccine would be a vast improvement and have an immediate impact on travel medicine.”
Like all “patch” technology, the medicine held inside the patch is delivered through the skin instead of a needle, allowing for pain-free medication – or vaccination, in this case – that is far more portable than normal vaccination kits.
Dr. Gregory Glenn, M.D., Iomai’s founder and chief scientific officer, was extremely proud at this stage of the vaccine patch’s success.
“These convincing results, demonstrating high levels of efficacy in a real-world setting, serve as validation of our TCI approach,” Glenn said in the statement. “The data suggests that our TCI technology can be used to provide against other pathogens. We are moving as quickly as possible to complete our Phase 2 work so we can begin pivotal trials and bring our traveler’s diarrhea vaccine candidate to market.”
Share prices for IOMI hit $1.88 by mid-morning, with a stock volume of just over 200 thousand and a dollar volume of $438,169.
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