NeuroVax launches trial of MS vaccine

CARLSBAD, Calif., Oct. 10 (UPI) -- U.S. firm Immune Response Corp. said Tuesday it has secured a contractor for its phase 2 trial of NeuroVax, a vaccine for multiple sclerosis.

The company said it has contracted with Accelsiors CRO & Consultancy Services to oversee the study.

IRC said it would start enrolling patients in the study by the end of the year, eventually recruiting 200 subjects with relapsing-remitting MS.

The study will be powered to compare the cumulative number of new gadolinium enhancing brain lesions -- a key marker of the disease -- via manetic resonance imaging scans at 24, 32, 40, and 48 weeks.

"We are extremely excited at the potential of NeuroVax(TM) to help patients with Multiple Sclerosis," said Krzysztof Selmaj, the study's lead investigator. "This treatment may have the ability to alter how the immune system fights MS and we eagerly anticipate study results that could offer benefit to the millions of MS patients in need of more effective and tolerable treatment options."

NeuroVax is a T-cell receptor (TCR) peptide vaccine.

According to IRC, MS affects about 400,000 people in the United States and roughly 2.5 million people worldwide.

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