TOVAXIN ROLE CALL

[IHaveMS-com]

Hi Bob,

Despite your disdain for posting I appreciate your posting on thisisms because you seem to know or be able to find the answers regarding what I think is by far the most exciting thing in the history of MS research.

Disdain is a feeling of contempt. Which I certainly do not have. I have always said I dislike posting because it makes me feel like I am plugged into an electric outlet. My nerve ending get all fired up. Here lately, I have not had that feeling, so as you have noted, I have been doing a lot of posting. I hope to be back later with some comments on monoclonal antibodies and what I mean by masking MRTCs.

[IHaveMS-com]

Hi Robbie,

Sounds like my wife and i can both benefit from this.

Opexa has the rights to a rheumatoid arthritis vaccine using the same T-cell elimination process that Tovaxin uses. They plan to apply that same T-cell elimination process to a vaccine for type one diabetes. Currently they are in preclinical trial using their patented adult stem cell procedure to grow new islet cells for people with type one diabetes.

[robbie]

They plan to apply that same T-cell elimination process to a vaccine for type one diabetes. Currently they are in preclinical trial using their patented adult stem cell procedure to grow new islet cells for people with type one diabetes.

My wife likes this idea. At some point i hope that one company gets far enough along with their research and proff of their results that other companies and researchers say hey "this is it this guys got it" so lets pool all our resourcses and money togeather and get it done. Could you imagine that, what a day it would be.As a person with ms just knowing that they knew how to, even if it would be 10 years before it was avaiable just knowing that would really take you out of the clouds and give you real tangible hope. Do you think this will ever happen, i know theirs strong competition but they will concede victory for us right. I was thinking that i shouldn't post comments like this here it's not research but i'm not getting the delete option anyways sorry.

[Lyon]

I usually check email before I go to bed. I must have been dreaming last night, because I would swear there was a picture on this thread of a proud graduate surrounded by her family and a pretty fancy cake. Maybe I need to add hallucinations to my list of symptoms.

Hi Tim,
You're right. I don't like to change a post after someone has responded and I don't like posting twice in a row (although I've done it). When I found the Opexa press release, getting that online was my top priority and, since no one had yet responded, I changed the original post to what it is now and deleted the picture of the fat guy and his cheesecake.

Opexa has the rights to a rheumatoid arthritis vaccine using the same T-cell elimination process that Tovaxin uses. They plan to apply that same T-cell elimination process to a vaccine for type one diabetes. Currently they are in preclinical trial using their patented adult stem cell procedure to grow new islet cells for people with type one diabetes.

I think that's an excellent point made at an opportune time. In an earlier posting I mentioned that Tovaxin isn't a cure for "several" reasons and in my opinion the above quote relates to what I consider one of the main reasons.

Because my primary interest in the autoimmune diseases is the relationship of the "loss of evolutionary normal conditions" as a primary situation leading to the incidence of autoimmune disease in "developed" populations, I'm aware that all of the autoimmune diseases are a variation of the same thing and that a "cure" is going to need to not only eliminate MS but all signs and symptoms of all autoimmune diseases a person might have. When Opexa develops a vaccine which simultaniously targets the self reactive T cells for all organs.....THAT would be a cure.
The evidence shows that Opexa is aware of that and is intentionally working towards that end.

Most people also consider a "cure" to be a one time treatment, or treatment regimin, as opposed to enduring a lifetime of treatments. I have to believe that Opexa is working on a means to specifically eliminate the faulty B memory cells.

Hopefully at some point Tovaxin will eventually evolve into a "soup" which will permenantly eliminate allergy, asthma and all autoimmune disease.

Bob

[IHaveMS-com]

Hi Bob,

A quote from Bob

In an earlier posting I mentioned that Tovaxin isn't a cure for "several" reasons and in my opinion the above quote relates to what I consider one of the main reasons.

In a previous post I mentioned,

A true cure will not be eliminating the MRTCs or the memory WBCs that produce them, but removing the mechanism by which the immune system is triggered to produce MRTCs.

That probably is along the same lines as your "loss of evolutionary normal conditions".

[Lars]

Bob and Tim,
It is apparent that neither of you took my "day off" advice. If anything you guys have raised the bar on posts! I hope the graduation party was a smashing sucess. I have one on the horizon as well. Thanks for all the new info. I am at the 9 week point, so as you all must know the anticipation is mounting. Again, enjoy your weekends.
Lars

[IHaveMS-com]

Hi Cure,

Tysabri is an infusion once a month and Campath is 5 days of infusion once a year. I thought their method of action was pretty similar. The drug that supposedly reboots the immune system is Revimmune. I will paste in some information on it.

This is an excerpt from an interview conducted on July 21, 2003 with one of the doctors working on the development of Campath. Campath was suspended on 9/16/05. Had I not gotten into the Tovaxin trials, we were seriously considering Campath.

In this full-length doctor's interview, Daniel Jacobs, M.D., explains how a new drug targets destructive white blood cells in MS patients and could stop the disease in its tracks. Ivanhoe Broadcast News Transcript with
Daniel Jacobs, M.D., Neurologist,
TOPIC: New Hope for MS

Tell me about the history of this new treatment for MS.
Dr. Jacobs: Campath-1H is a monoclonal antibody that attacks T-cells, which are the cells that attack the myelin in multiple sclerosis. This drug is given as an infusion. Patients don’t have to get daily shots. They can get an intravenous infusion of drug for five days a year without shots, and it will reduce their relapses and improve the MRI signs of multiple sclerosis. We have not studied it in a huge number of patients yet, so we cannot make any claims about efficacy. But the pilot studies suggest that it’s very effective and maybe more effective than the existing treatments for multiple sclerosis.

Explain to me how Campath-1H works.
Dr. Jacobs: The drug is a new type of drug called a monoclonal antibody that attacks certain types of white cells that attack the brain and spinal cord and cause multiple sclerosis. It helps prevent the attacks of multiple sclerosis. The drug is a new class of drug called monoclonal antibodies, which attack certain white blood cells that attack the brain and spinal cord and turn these white blood cells off. As a result, multiple sclerosis relapses can be eliminated.

This is an article fro Reuters about the withdrawal of Campath.

New MS drug Campath trial suspended due to serious side effects that led to a death - 9/16/05
Drug manufacturers Genzyme and Schering have suspended dosing in the trial for the new multiple sclerosis drug Campath because of its link to a death. In three cases, Campath caused idiopathic thrombocytopenic purpura, or ITP, a condition in which patients experience a low platelet count that can result in abnormal bleeding. One patient died from the condition. Two remaining cases are being treated.

Campath is in Phase II, or mid-stage testing trials. The companies say they are consulting with a panel of experts to advise them on how to reduce the risks of ITP as well as with the FDA on how to protect patient safety. Campath is presently used to treat leukemia and has sales of $77 million last year.

Source: Julie Steenhuysen and Sitaraman Shankar, “Genzyme drug helps MS; serious side effect seen,” Reuters, September 16, 2005.

The treatment that is supposed to reboot the immune system is Revimmune. The following is from a press release from the company that has the rights to the drug and is testing it.

Revimmune uses an ultra-high intensity, short-course of an intravenous formulation of an approved drug (cyclophosphamide), in a new patent-pending method to "reboot" a patient's immune system, thereby eliminating the autoimmunity, whereas current therapies including oral cyclophosphamide are used chronically to try to suppress the inflammation of autoimmunity. Based on long-term follow-up showing complete remissions, there is substantial evidence that Revimmune has the potential to cure cases of severe refractory autoimmune diseases such as aplastic anemia and myasthenia gravis. Accentia's lead indication for Revimmune is multiple sclerosis (MS).

This is a comment from The Baylor School of Medicine on Cyclophosphamide.

Cyclophosphamide is an alkalating agent with cytotoxic effects on lymphocytes. Data from European centers and the USA indicated that cyclophosphamide arrested disease progression in a proportion of treated patients, with some suggestion that booster therapy was important, and that young women benefited most. The US study did not include placebo patients & the clinical behavior of their treated group mimicked that of placebo patients in other studies. A Canadian collaborative study did not show any benefit, but no booster therapy was employed.

[robbie]

So is Campath and Tovaxin basically the same thing except for the timing and amount of infusions?, and why does it seem to be safer? Are they just two different companies with the same drug and goal?.

[IHaveMS-com]

Hi Robbie,

So is Campath and Tovaxin basically the same thing except for the timing and amount of infusions?, and why does it seem to be safer? Are they just two different companies with the same drug and goal?.

Do you mean Campath and Tysabri?

[Lyon]

In a previous post I mentioned,

A true cure will not be eliminating the MRTCs or the memory WBCs that produce them, but removing the mechanism by which the immune system is triggered to produce MRTCs.

That probably is along the same lines as your "loss of evolutionary normal conditions".

Hi Tim,
ABSOLUTELY, perfectly correct! But after obsessing about the "loss of evolutionary normal" scenario for six years I'm convinced that this is one situation in which defining and reversing the cause isn't going to result in what the general public would describe as a satisfactory "cure" and that's why my money is on Tovaxin.....or more accurately, what Tovaxin will evolve to be someday.

Bob and Tim,
It is apparent that neither of you took my "day off" advice. If anything you guys have raised the bar on posts! I hope the graduation party was a smashing sucess. I have one on the horizon as well. Thanks for all the new info. I am at the 9 week point, so as you all must know the anticipation is mounting. Again, enjoy your weekends.
Lars

Hi Lars,
Of course you've heard the quote "no rest for the wicked"?? The bad thing about an obsession is that it allows for no days off! Tim can say what he wants but he's obviously obsessive too!

Bob

[Lars]

Bob,
Amen and thanks for the obsessed.

[IHaveMS-com]

Hi Bob and Lars,

Currently I am obsessing over what actually happens when something a patients takes prevents the detection of MRTCs. Opexa dangles 100 different peptide fragments over 3 of the major myelin proteins to identify an individual's MRTC set. Why don't the MRTCs go for the bait?

If someone has an article about this or what you feel is a good explanation for it, please post it.

[Lyon]

So is Campath and Tovaxin basically the same thing except for the timing and amount of infusions?, and why does it seem to be safer? Are they just two different companies with the same drug and goal?.

Hi robbie,
Although the goal is similar, Tovaxin is different than anything else used to treat the autoimmune diseases in that it isn't a drug, isn't a poison and in that it acts to eliminate the specific part of the immune system which is acting inappropriately rather than suppressing the entire immune system.

That's why I mention that the suppression strategy is a dead end street. The goal is to STOP the part of the immune system which is acting up, not suppress (circumvent) the entire immune system due to one faulty aspect. Broad suppression can never lead to a cure because it can only slow things down and not stop them. That's why you can see numbers like 100% associated with Tovaxin and never will see anything close to that with things like the crabs, Tysabri, steroids, etc...

Bob

[Lyon]

Yeah, it's not lost on me that I just posted a second time in a row

Hi Bob and Lars,

Currently I am obsessing over what actually happens when something a patients takes prevents the detection of MRTCs. Opexa dangles 100 different peptide fragments over 3 of the major myelin proteins to identify an individual's MRTC set. Why don't the MRTCs go for the bait?

Hi Tim,
That's an aspect that I've never known enough about to obsess over but the way you put it is interesting, comparing the peptide fragments to bait that the mrtc's would go after.

What you mention or ask is going to be hard to solve because the situation involves many different substances, probably using multiple different means to produce the effect (or lack of effect) that we label as not being able to isolate the necessary mrtc's and is a situation in which chemists aren't always able to define the mechanisms responsible at this point. Steroids have been around for a long time but when it gets to that level I'm not sure that chemists can say how they affect the mrtc's.

With the vial of blood removed from the body it might seem that the immune system stuff would stop immediately, but I don't think so...and so binding and labelling for immune system attack probably would still be going on in the vials.

I think one important aspect to keep in mind is that we don't know how effective the Opexa labs are at isolating the mrtc's...if there are 10 million mrtc's in a vial of blood is the system capable of isolating 100% of them? 50% of them of 5% of them? That's very important because if the percentage is low it would be very easy for a small amount of masking to render the isolation process unworkable. If the system is capable of isolating a high percentage of the total per volume mrtc's, it would take a huge amount of masking to create a problem.

Possibly certain substances...maybe like that curry thing you mentioned the other day, those molecules bind to the mrtc receptors but, obviously aren't capable of labelling them for immune system elimination. I don't know if it's possible but maybe they only bind temporarily, leaving the mrtc to live and attack another day or maybe they somehow cause the mrtc to become temporarily lethargic and not want to chomp on myelin for a while?

That brings up another situation I've wondered about and that involves the fact that once the blood is removed and put in the vial it obviously becomes it's own environment, separate from what is happening in the donor. What happens during the trip to the lab? Are mrtc's among the first to decompose or something along that line? Are the test tubes vaccums or is there air in them and if so what does being exposed to air do to blood and in this case, specifically mrtc's on the trip to the lab.

I think it would be interesting to take someone who obviously has MS and who has repeatedly tested negative for mrtc's and fly them to Houston to have their blood tested immediately after being drawn.

I'll try but I still need to know more before I can do any worthwhile obsessing
Bob

[IHaveMS-com]

Hi Bob,

I have never seen so many what ifs. I will see if I can weed a few of them out.

I think one important aspect to keep in mind is that we don't know how effective the Opexa labs are at isolating the mrtc's...if there are 10 million mrtc's in a vial of blood is the system capable of isolating 100% of them? 50% of them of 5% of them?

To quote the article you quoted. There was a 100% reduction in attacks in the mid-dose group (the dose that is being used in the current IIb trial). From that, it would be safe to assume that Opexa is doing a good job at identifying the patient's set of MRTCs.

Possibly certain substances...maybe like that curry thing you mentioned the other day, those molecules bind to the mrtc receptors but, obviously aren't capable of labelling them for immune system elimination. I don't know if it's possible but maybe they only bind temporarily, leaving the mrtc to live and attack another day or maybe they somehow cause the mrtc to become temporarily lethargic and not want to chomp on myelin for a while?

If this were possible, you would continue taking curry every day and that would be way better than the CRAB drugs.

That brings up another situation I've wondered about and that involves the fact that once the blood is removed and put in the vial it obviously becomes it's own environment, separate from what is happening in the donor. What happens during the trip to the lab?

The blood cells frolic and have a merry old time. The fact is that there is a special substance in the vial that stabilizes the blood for the trip. This stabilization only lasts for a short while, and that is why it is critical to get the blood to the lab quickly.

Are mrtc's among the first to decompose or something along that line?

MRTCs are no different from other T-cells other than they are self reactive. They are programmed for a different target, but there longevity should be no different than any other WBC.

Are the test tubes vaccums or is there air in them and if so what does being exposed to air do to blood and in this case, specifically mrtc's on the trip to the lab.

The test tubes have vacuum, that is what draws the blood into the tube. On earth, there is no such thing as a perfect vacuum, so there will be some gas in the tube. What gas is in the tube I do not. If it is anything special, it would be working to stabilize the sample.

Since I think you enjoy fishing, here is a thought I had, but discarded it. Maybe masking is like dangling a worm in front of a fish. If the fish isn't hungry or is not stimulated by the bait, it does not go after the bait. Opexa dangles 100 different peptide fragments over 3 of the major myelin proteins to identify an individual's MRTC set. Why don't the MRTCs go for the bait? If this is in fact the case, then masking would down-regulate the appetite of MRTCs and there by lessen attacks. I really do not have a handle on this.