Weight Battle

BANGALORE: Life sciences company Avesthagen Limited today announced the launch of clinically validated bioactive "Teestar", aimed at promoting wellness through better blood sugar management.

Teestar, made from 100 per cent natural ingredients, would be available as dietary supplements as well as in cracker (biscuit) categories in the third week of May, the Bangalore based company's Founder, Chairperson and Managing Director, Dr Villoo Morawala Patell, told reporters.

Avesthagen said it used two of its patent technologies to develop Teestar.

They are 'Adept', a database that brings together traditional medicine with modern systems biology and 'MetaGrid', an algorithm that enables constituent profiling of the plant extracts, the company said.

"In the field of functional foods, we made the next level achievement by introducing Teestar, the product evaluated after understanding science behind activity and designing the clinical studies to prove the concept of keeping all parental variables in check using Avesthagen technology", Patell said.

The company said whole wheat crackers, enriched with Teestar, the proprietary ingredient that has been clinically proven to signficantly reduce blood glucose levels, are being launched through its subsidiary, Avestha Good Earth Foods Pvt Ltd.

Meanwhile, Patell would be bestowed the award of Officier de L'Ordre National du Merite (Officer of the National Order of Merit) by the Ambassador of France to India Jerome Bonnafont here this evening.

BANGALORE: Biotech major, Biocon, has decided to split its cardio-diabetes group by launching a stand alone cardiology division.

The new division is being launched to focus on brand building for its flagship station based product statix as well as other products like Telmisat, Eptifibatide and its recombinant streptokinase product Myokinase, Biocon Limited CMD, Kiran Mazumdar Shaw, told reporters today.

She said the cardiology market in India constitutes 10 percent, approximately Rs 3200 crore of the Indian Pharma market and is growing at 21 percent.

"This division is envisaged to have an all India presence through a 250 plus strong field force", she said.

On the issue of clinical trials, she said Biocon has commenced phase 'IIa' Clinical trials for IN105. The study is expected to be completed in August 2008 and will provide necessary data to commence phase 'two b' clinical trials.

Bicon has also commenced phase two B trials for T1 for rheumatoid Arhrities and active psoriasis. "These trials will help biocon to establish proof of concept for T1 H and will add tremendous value to licensing potential", she said.

The phase three B trials for Glioma and NSCLC for BIOMaB EGFR is ongoing at eight investigation sites.

Speaking on the issue of slowdown in the US, she said this could spell opportunity for India. With big pharma companies forced to reduce their R and D spends, this work was bound to come to India. With high cost component and the factor of time to market being crucial these firms would have to look to new areas like India.

SINGAPORE: The world risks wiping out a huge amount of future antibiotics and disease cures if it fails to reverse the rapid extinction of thousands of plant and animal species, experts warned on Wednesday.

Biodiversity loss has reached alarming levels, and disappearing with it are the secrets to finding treatments for pain, infections and a wide array of ailments such as cancer, they said, citing the findings of a coming book.

Achim Steiner, executive director of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), said more than 16,000 known species are threatened with extinction.

"We must do something about what is happening to biodiversity," he said at a news conference on the sidelines of the UN-backed Business for the Environment conference.

"Societies depend on nature for treating diseases. Health systems over human history have their foundation on animal and plant products that are used for treatment."

Technological revolution in the 19th and 20th centuries took the focus on finding cures away from nature as pharmaceutical companies relied on technical components to make medicines, he said.

These companies are increasingly turning back to nature as they run out of chemical compounds.

But the world is "losing the intellectual patents of nature before we even have the chance to understand or unravel them," Steiner said.

"This is the tragedy of not understanding biodiversity." The book, previewed at the conference, cited the example of the southern gastric brooding frog discovered in the rainforests of Australia in the 1980s. It has since become extinct.

Research on those frogs could have led to new insights into preventing and treating human peptic ulcers which affect 25 million people in the United States alone, according to the authors of the book, "Sustaining Life."

DUBAI: A leading Bahraini businessman has proposed to set up a medical city in Bangalore the help of investors from Gulf countries.
Abdulnabi Al Sho'ala, Chairman of the Bahrain-India Society has proposed to the Federation of GCC Chambers of Commerce and Industry to establish a committee to examine the proposal and arrange a feasibility study.

The former Labour and Social Development minister, who led a delegation from Bahrain to a meeting organised by the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry also made a presentation on the proposed project at a Conclave in New Delhi last week, the media reported.

India should be preferred as the natural destination as it has many advantages. GCC nationals feel at home and feel familiar with the culture, food habits, environment in India, he said.

"While GCC nationals are currently not utilising the potential of India as a medical care destination for various reasons, India, however, is perceived as the preferred choice for medical treatment by Western nationals," Al Sho'ala said.

"Europe and the US are the destinations of some members of the affluent segment of GCC citizens. However, the majority of GCC citizens cannot afford the expensive treatment in US and Europe to such segments the only alternative is Asian destinations."

The proposed project will not only cater to the needs of GCC market, but also to the Indian market as a whole, he said, adding that Gulf Finance House has already taken a similar initiative by establishing the new Energy City in Mumbai.

A Medical and Health Care City is even more viable and very attractive to the investors of both the countries, he added.

HYDERABAD: MakroCare has announced the completion of Oracle Clinical Implementation to strengthen its clinical data management services.
This implementation will help the company in creating a faster data management solution, which improves time lines and optimizes the cost of the clinical trial.

MakroCare has top of the line infrastructure to help life sciences companies to conduct the global trials.

Some of them include Oracle Clinical (version 4.5.2), Oracle Thesaurus Management System, MedDRA (Version 10) dictionary, mCTMS and SAS.

Oracle Clinical is a comprehensive clinical data management solution which allows companies to standardise and control data definitions and data usage across the global operation, ensuring that data is defined, managed, and interpreted consistently worldwide.

MakroCare is the first to receive ISO 27001 certification for information security.

The company has been awarded ISO 9001 for Data management security system and several other protective measures.

MakroCare, a global clinical services firm, provides clinical research support to pharmaceutical, biotechnology, and medical device industries.