GODMANCHESTER, Cambridgeshire, U.K. (5 June 2007) –

Phytopharm plc (LSE: PYM) (”Phytopharm” or the “Company”) announces today pre-clinical data showing that Cogane™ reverses the changes in the area of the brain involved in Parkinson’s disease. This data will be presented by Dr Jonathan Brotchie, an internationally recognised expert on Parkinson’s disease at ‘The 11th International Congress of Parkinson’s Disease and Movement Disorders’ 5 June in Istanbul, Turkey and published in The Movement Disorders Society’s journal*.

Cogane™ reverses the changes in area of the brain involved in Parkinson’s disease by inducing the production of neurotrophic factors. These growth factors promote the growth and connectivity of neurones and reverse the atrophy of this area of the brain. This latest study was partly funded by The Cure Parkinson’s Trust.

Commenting, Tom Isaacs, co-founder of The Cure Parkinson’s Trust said: “Cogane’s ability to induce a person’s own neurotrophic activity offers a very real prospect of a better treatment for Parkinson’s disease. As a patient led organisation, The Cure Parkinson’s Trust is very excited about the potential of this product to completely restore motor function to those with the condition. We are delighted our targeted fund allocation in this area of research has been directly involved in these latest findings.”

Commenting, Dr Daryl Rees, Chief Executive Officer of Phytopharm, said: “There is an urgent need for new therapeutic approaches to Parkinson’s disease. Pre-clinical studies with Cogane™, an orally bioavailable neurotrophic factor inducer, have been highly encouraging in reversing the changes in the area of the brain involved in Parkinson’s disease, providing hope that Cogane™ could restore normal control of movement.”

Notes to Editors

Phytopharm plc

Phytopharm is a pharmaceutical development and functional food company whose product leads are generated from medicinal plants. The Company’s strategy is to develop these products through ‘proof of principle’ clinical testing, and then secure partners for late stage development, sales and marketing. Laboratory, manufacturing and clinical work is outsourced to selected specialists, operating under expert in-house management. This operational structure allows access to the best external research facilities whilst maintaining low fixed overheads and a lower development cost structure.

Cogane™

Cogane™ (PYM50028) is a novel non-peptide, orally bioavailable neurotrophic factor inducer that readily crosses the blood brain barrier. In pre-clinical studies, Cogane™ stimulates the release of neuronal growth factors, increases neurite outgrowth and protects against neuronal degeneration. Importantly, Cogane™ also reverses the decrease of neuronal growth factors and reverses dopaminergic neuronal degeneration observed in vitro. When administered orally to pre-clinical models of Parkinson’s disease, Cogane™ reverses the loss of dopaminergic neurones.

*Movement Disorders (2007) Vol 22 (Suppl 16): page S18, abstract number 58.

Parkinson’s disease

Parkinson’s disease is a movement disorder characterised by muscle rigidity, tremor, a slowing of physical movement (bradykinesia) and, in extreme cases, a loss of physical movement (akinesia). The primary symptoms are the result of altered signaling of an area of the brain, the striatum, responsible for the control of movement. This is caused by degeneration of dopaminergic neurones between the striatum and the substantia nigra part of the brain leading to insufficient formation and action of dopamine. Parkinson’s disease is therefore termed a neurodegenerative disease. The disease is slow in onset and the appearance of symptoms reflects the gradual loss of dopaminergic neurones.

The prevalence of the disease is estimated to be 100 to 200 per 100,000 population (Source: Datamonitor). In the US alone, there are estimated to be one million patients with diagnosed Parkinson’s disease with associated healthcare costs to the economy of $25 billion (Source: Northwest Parkinson’s Foundation submission to US Congress). Parkinson’s disease can affect people of any age, though the incidence is higher in older people. Individuals will experience varying combinations of the symptoms, each with differing degrees of severity. The cause of Parkinson’s disease in the majority of cases is unknown (idiopathic Parkinson’s disease), though some cases have been found to have a hereditary component (familial Parkinson’s disease) and possible mechanisms include oxidative damage of nerve cells coupled with loss of neurotrophic factors. Neurotrophic factors are essential for the survival and maintenance of nerve cells and provide protection against toxic insults, however as proteins, their utility as pharmacological treatments are limited (Source: The Cure Parkinson’s Trust).

At present, there is no cure for Parkinson’s disease, but a variety of medications provide relief from the symptoms, usually by dopamine replacement therapy either by L-DOPA, which is converted to dopamine in the striatum, or by dopamine agonists which act on the dopamine receptors to restore normal motor function (control of movement). However, both treatments cause either less endogenous dopamine to be released or the dopamine receptors to become progressively less sensitive, thereby eventually increasing the symptoms. There is an urgent need for the development of new approaches to this debilitating condition and non-peptide orally bioavailable neurotrophic factor inducers that readily cross the blood brain barrier represent an important therapeutic approach.
For further information about Phytopharm please see our website at www.phytopharm.com

Dr Jonathan Brotchie

Dr Jonathan Brotchie is Senior Scientist at the Toronto Western Hospital, part of the University Health Network (UHN) in Toronto, Canada. He is also the Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Atuka Ltd., a contract research and consultancy services company for the development of novel therapeutics and diagnostics for Parkinson’s disease. Jonathan is a renowned scientist in the field of Parkinson’s disease and, at UHN runs one of the world’s premier research laboratories for the identification of novel treatments, diagnostics and cures for Parkinson’s and related disorders. In the last decade, he has published many influential scientific papers in the field of Parkinson’s disease and related disorders. His research has been particularly associated with pioneering the concept of non-dopaminergic treatments for Parkinson’s disease.

Jonathan is also Scientific Director of the Cure Parkinson’s Trust, a charity supporting research aimed at delivering better treatments and cures for PD.

The Cure Parkinson’s Trust

The Cure Parkinson’s Trust supported by Movers & Shakers was co-founded by four individuals with Parkinson’s who are determined to do everything in their power to help find a cure for this debilitating neurological disease. They are former Lord Mayor of London, Sir Richard Nichols, David Jones CBE, former chairman of Next Plc, Michael Hughes and Tom Isaacs.

Parkinson’s disease can affect anyone at any time. It does not discriminate by age, sex or nationality. One in every 500 people, contracts Parkinson’s, with one in every 20 of those diagnosed each year being under the age of 40 years. A cure for Parkinson’s disease is within reach.

The Cure Parkinson’s Trust has been funding a variety of research projects globally. For further details see: www.cureparkinsons.org.uk

I am fairly certain I met these people at Bios. They said they knew Tom Isaacs, needed funding, had an appointment with FOX, think they had something that was producing GDNF.

Everett and other alternative treatment devotees, do you realize this is a plant abstract? I'm hearing an ancient medicinal plant.

Tom Isaacs was a tireless advocate against the GDNF cancellation in the UK.

Here is where OUR work is cut out....do you want to wait 15 years to find out if this works? Especially if it's food.

It's time to focus on what is happening in the FDA. More to come about this.

paula

There was an Alzheimer's Phase II study in the UK completed in 2005. I'm still searching for results, but here is info from one of their reports (emphasis is mine)

Now, in the neuro-degenerative disease area, we’ve developed a family of synthetic neuro-regenerative compounds from an Asian plant that are first in class therapeutic agents. They make ageing nerve cells re-grow when they have begun to degenerate due to either toxic damage or damage due to the ageing process. We are currently in Phase II in Alzheimer’s disease with our lead compound coded PYM50028, which was discovered using this approach of ours, of taking medicinal plants and doing trials in man. Following the successful demonstration in a clinical trial of the effects of the plant extract in reversing Alzheimer’s dementia, we initiated a program of pharmacological research that isolated the active compound, confirmed its mechanism of action, and lead to the development of a large library of synthetic compounds that share the same activity profile. PYM50028 is a synthetic chemical similar to the one found in the plant, but we can make it at very low cost.

http://www.twst.com/pdf/YAA607.pdf

(emphasis is mine)


From Phytopharm 2006 annual report:


In late November 2005 we announced the
preliminary results obtained from the Phase IIa
clinical study of Cogane™ in mild and moderate
Alzheimer’s disease patients. The Oxford Project to
Investigate Memory and Ageing (OPTIMA) was the
lead clinical centre and 15 other sites in the UK


Two hundred and fifty-six subjects with Alzheimer’s
disease ranging in severity from mild to moderate
were randomly allocated to receive either 120 mg
Cogane™ (n = 127) or a placebo (n = 129), orally
once daily for 12 weeks. The majority of patients
enrolled had mild disease. The baseline
demography data confirmed that the treatment
groups were well balanced for factors such as age,
gender and severity of disease.

The overall safety data confirmed that Cogane™
administered orally once daily for up to 12 weeks is
well tolerated and has a good overall clinical safety
profile. There were no substantial differences in the
adverse event and laboratory safety data for
each group.

The prospectively defined primary efficacy
measures were cognitive assessments measured
using CANTAB-PAL and the Hopkins verbal learning
test. The baseline scores and changes over time
were not significantly different between the groups.
Although the Phase IIa clinical trial was not of a
sufficient duration to observe deterioration in
cognitive function in the group of Alzheimer’s
patients whose disease severity included both mild
and moderate disease, a subset analysis on the
smaller number of patients with moderate
Alzheimer’s disease showed a trend towards
deterioration in the placebo group, with no
significant deterioration observed in the Cogane™
group.
This encouraging trend for slower disease
progression in more moderate Alzheimer’s patients
with Cogane™ coupled with its excellent tolerability,
confirms the need for longer term studies for
efficacy determination. Further work has now been
initiated in preparation for further clinical studies
and discussions with potentially suitable licensees
have progressed to detailed evaluations and due
diligence assessments of the full data set.