Oxford spinout Oxford Biomedica was yesterday awarded £0.5 million by the Department of Health to conduct the first British gene therapy haemophilia trial.
The Health Secretary, John Reid, announced yesterday the successful bidders for £4m funding for research into gene therapy. Oxford BioMedica was awarded £0.5 million to develop its proprietary LentiVector® technology for use in the treatment of single gene inherited disorders. The focus of the work is to be haemophilia A.
Haemophilia A is a condition caused by a defective gene involved in the mechanism for forming blood clots. The errors in the gene mean that blood does not clot properly, causing haemophiliacs to bleed uncontrollably. About 400,000 people are affected, and are currently treated with injections of blood-clotting agent about three times a month.
The LentiVector technology is a method of delivering gene therapy using harmless viruses. Three years ago Biomedica, a biopharmaceutical company specialising in the development of novel gene-based therapeutics with a focus on the areas of oncology and neurotherapy,initiated a programme to develop a LentiVector gene delivery system carrying the gene crucial to blood clotting – and solved several problems that had been encountered by others attempting gene therapy for haemophilia. However, since haemophilia falls outside of the company's therapeutic focus of cancer and neurotherapy, the programme has received minimal internal resources. The new money from the Department of Health will enable the company to move the haemophilia programme forward.