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Exhibit 99.5
NEW COMPANY FORMED TO DEVELOP DIAGNOSTIC FOR "MAD COW DISEASE" AND
HUMAN PRION DISEASES
SCIENTISTS RECOGNIZE URGENT NEED FOR SCREENING CATTLE FOR BSE
NEW YORK, NY, Nov. 30 /PRNewswire/ - Genesis Bioventures (GBI,
officially BioLabs, Inc. OTC:BILB) is pleased to announce that
Prion Developmental Laboratories, Inc., one of GBI's portfolio
companies, has started the development of a rapid, sensitive and
inexpensive screening test for prion diseases in animals and
humans. Prions are the infectious agents that cause a family of
fatal neurodegenerative diseases, most notably "Mad Cow Disease"
in cattle and a new variant of Creutzfeldt-Jacob Disease (CJD) in
humans.
PRION DEVELOPMENTAL LABORATORIES
Prion Developmental Laboratories (PDL) is a private Maryland company that has
established research collaborations with three major research institutions in
the United States that are considered leading centers in prion diseases and
diagnostic test development. The members of this research and product
development team include Case Western Reserve University (CWRU) in Cleveland,
Ohio; The University of Maryland Biotechnology Institute (UMBI) in Baltimore,
Maryland; and The Institute for Basic Research and Developmental Disabilities
(IBR) in Staten Island, New York.
The Principal Investigator and head of PDL's Scientific Advisory Board for this
project is Robert C. Gallo, MD, Professor of Virology at the University of
Maryland and Director of the Institute of Human Virology. The product
development collaboration will be coordinated by Dr. Robert Petersen, Chief
Scientific Advisor at PDL and an Associate Professor in the Department of
Pathology at CWRU.
"Prion diseases in humans and animals are of increasing concern because these
diseases are fatal and cannot be diagnosed early," said Dr. Gallo. "The
availability of a diagnostic test to detect prions in presymptomatic humans and
animals would help to relieve concern about the safety of the human blood supply
and assist in maintaining the safety of products from animals. Our approach is
to assemble novel and highly sensitive diagnostic techniques and adapt them to
detect the abnormal prion proteins in blood."
"Unfortunately, at present the only way to diagnose "Mad Cow Disease" in cattle
or the human form of the disease, known as new variant CJD (nvCJD), is after the
symptoms have developed and the disease is entering its late stages. By then
it's usually too late to ensure that infected meat or beef products have not
entered the human food supply," said Dr. Petersen of Prion Developmental
Laboratories. "There is still no treatment for prion diseases, including BSE and
nvCJD, but a reliable and sensitive diagnostic would permit the testing not only
of cattle, but also of human blood products and tissues before they are used in
medical procedures. This diagnostic would provide a great deal of peace-of-mind
among consumers, agricultural and public health officials worldwide."
ABOUT PRION DISEASES
Prion diseases are a family of fatal neurodegenerative diseases that are caused
by a prion, an "infectious proteinaceous particle". These diseases occur in
humans in both sporadic (i.e. randomly occurring) and genetic forms at a very
low incidence, primarily affecting persons older than 50 years of age.
Infectious forms of prion diseases are also known in animals, including scrapie
in sheep and "Chronic Wasting Disease" in mule deer and elk.
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In all forms of prion diseases, the underlying cause appears to be that the
prion protein can occur in two different three-dimensional shapes: normal and
misfolded. The abnormal form can induce other normal prion proteins to mimic
their shape, thereby leading to dementia and eventual death. These diseases are
characterized by the formation of plaques, which are deposits of misfolded prion
proteins accumulating in the brain. The brain becomes spongy and full of holes,
leading to the fatal neurodegenerative symptoms. Based on these changes to brain
structure, prion diseases are also known as "spongiform encephalopathies" (i.e.
spongy-like brain diseases). Prion diseases are difficult to diagnose since they
are not amenable to standard detection methods used for identifying bacteria and
viruses and since it is difficult to distinguish the normal form of the prion
protein from the disease-causing form.
Prion diseases became a worldwide concern with the outbreak in the UK of Bovine
Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE) or "Mad Cow Disease" in the 1980's among cattle.
It appears that cattle were first infected by feed that was supplemented with
protein from sheep infected with scrapie. This probably occurred after changes
were implemented in the 1970s to the process for preparing animal feed that
resulted in infectious prions surviving the rendering process.
Subsequent to BSE appearing in cattle in the UK, a new variant of
Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (nvCJD) was diagnosed in humans. The first reported
case of nvCJD was in 1996 when a 19 year old individual died of this rapidly
fatal form of prion disease. To date, there have been over 80 deaths reported in
the UK, Ireland and France. This is particularly alarming, as it is believed
that nvCJD is transmitted to humans by eating infected beef or byproducts from
cattle infected with BSE, yet there is still no diagnostic test that can detect
the low levels of prions in pre-symptomatic cattle. Since the incubation period
for both BSE in cattle and nvCJD in humans is a number of years, the need for a
diagnostic is urgent.
URGENT NEED FOR IMPROVED PRION DIAGNOSTICS
Currently there are no rapid, sensitive screening tests that can detect the
presence of infectious prions before symptoms appear. There are several tests
being used in Europe that can diagnose the disease in cattle once an animal is
infected, but these require that a sample of brain tissue be removed at the
slaughterhouse and tested in a laboratory. There is an urgent need for a more
rapid and sensitive diagnostic that could detect the presence of infectious
prions at an earlier stage of the disease and provide accurate results without
requiring post-mortem brain samples.
The PDL prion diagnostic test will be developed first in a format that can be
used to test cattle at the slaughterhouse, and then secondly for testing human
blood at the point of collection, either at a blood bank or plasma center. In
the United States each year over 37 million head of cattle are slaughtered and
25 million units of human blood collected. This prion test will be designed to
detect BSE before the overt symptoms appear in cattle, with the objective of
ensuring that infected meat or cattle byproducts are removed from the market.
In addition to meat and related food products from cattle, certain beef products
are used in pharmaceuticals, vaccines, cosmetics and other consumer products.
Scientists are not entirely certain that all of these animal products can
transmit prion diseases from BSE infected cattle to humans. However, the recent
increase in cases of nvCJD in the UK, including the recent death of a 14 year
old person, emphasizes the urgent need to have a diagnostic test to exclude
infected cattle.
PRION DISEASE AND THE CATTLE INDUSTRY
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Both public concern and the lack of a diagnostic that can detect BSE before the
symptoms appear has led to significantly expanded slaughter of cattle herds to
eliminate any herds suspected of having been infected with BSE. Since 1996, when
culling of cattle was implemented in an attempt to eradicate BSE in cattle, over
4.5 million cattle have been slaughtered in Europe, with financial losses
estimated at over $2.5 billion. Testing on the animals afterward indicated that
an estimated 175,000 were infected with BSE. Outbreaks of the disease are
continuing to appear in other countries throughout Europe.
In the United States, a recent recommendation has been made to the Food and Drug
Administration by a panel of advisors that individuals who have spent in excess
of six months in the UK between 1980 and 1996 be prohibited from donating blood.
In addition, there is consideration being given to banning organ or tissue
donations from the same category of people. While no cases of BSE have been
reported in the United States, "Chronic Wasting Disease", a prion disease
similar to BSE, has appeared in deer and elk in Colorado and Wyoming.
PDL SCIENTIFIC COLLABORATORS
PDL intends to develop the prion diagnostic through the expertise of the
scientists at the three research institutes. Among the key scientists involved
in the product development program are Drs. Gallo, MD and Niel Constantine,
Ph.D. of the Institute of Human Virology at the University of Maryland; Drs.
Pierluigi Gambetti, MD and Man-Sun Sy, Ph.D. of Case Western Reserve University;
Drs. Richard Kascsak, Ph.D., and Richard Rubenstein, Ph.D. of the Institute for
Basic Research. Each of these scientists is a recognized expert in human and
animal prion diseases, or in the development of sensitive diagnostics for
hard-to-detect infectious agents.
"The PDL scientific team is composed of an unparalleled group of prion
scientists spanning immunology, virology, neuropathology, protein chemistry,
molecular biology, and immunodiagnostic development and testing," said David S.
Grosky, Chairman and CEO of PDL. "We are pleased that PDL was able to bring
together such a highly qualified group of research scientists to develop this
urgently needed diagnostic test."
GENESIS BIOVENTURES
Genesis Bioventures (GBI) is engaged in the business of identifying promising
biotechnology companies, acquiring an equity interest in these groups and
providing management services to assist with their corporate development. GBI
provides the financial resources, management expertise and commercialization
strategies to assist early stage biotechnology companies to make the transition
from laboratory-based research through to development of commercial products.
The focus is on companies that are developing products to address major medical
and healthcare needs in the areas of oncology, neurology and infectious disease.
At present, GBI holds an equity interest in Biotherapies, Inc., a private
biotechnology company in Michigan that is developing Mammastatin, a proprietary
protein technology that is a potential therapeutic for breast cancer. In a joint
venture with Biotherapies, GBI has also invested in Biomedical Diagnostics, LLC,
which is developing the Mammastatin Serum Assay (MSA) as a potential screening
diagnostic for the detection of breast cancer risk.
Most recently, GBI invested $2 million for a 25% equity interest in Prion
Developmental Laboratories. The corporate mission of PDL is initially to develop
a diagnostic for prion diseases and subsequently to evaluate the development of
diagnostics or therapeutics for other neurodegenerative diseases.
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Investor inquiries can be made to Lisa Baumgartner at Ruder-Finn at (212)
593-6352 or by e-mail to [email protected]. For additional information,
please call Genesis Bioventures at (604) 608-1000 or (604) 542- 0820, or view
GBI's web site at www.genesisbioventures.com
"Safe Harbor" Statement Under The Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of
1995: Any statements in this press release that relate to the Company's
expectations are forward-looking statements, within the meaning of the Private
Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Since this information may involve
risks and uncertainties and are subject to change at any time, the Company's
actual results may differ materially from expected results. Additional risks
associated with Genesis Bioventures' business can be found in its periodic
filings with the SEC.
