NanoViricides, Inc.
(OTC BB: NNVC.OB) (the "Company"), said that it has recently submitted
a grant application to the Department of Defense. This grant, if awarded, will
be used for the development of broad-spectrum nanoviricides drugs. If successful,
a broad-spectrum nanoviricide could be employed as an important Medical CounterMeasure
(MCM) against bio-terrorism and emerging infectious diseases such as Ebola/Marburg,
and Dengue.
The Company has already demonstrated that some of the nanoviricides we have
created are broad-spectrum. It is believed that viruses are unlikely to escape
such broad-spectrum nanoviricides by mutation because such mutations would also
cause a loss of infectivity.
At present, other MCM efforts have generally resulted in highly specific one-bug-one-drug
type of therapies, such as vaccines, antibodies, certain anti-sense therapeutics,
and some other antivirals. Thus, a large number of drugs, vaccines and antibodies
would need to be stockpiled to mitigate the threat from a countless number of
pathogens and their known mutants. Further, if a virus mutates further, then
most such agents are likely to become ineffective. Mutations are common in many
viruses, and can also be genetically engineered to produce devastating bio-terrorism
agents.
The Company has assembled a strong team comprising several renowned Institutions
and Companies for the proposed project. There is no guarantee that the grant
application will result in any funding.
Ebola viruses cause devastating disease with mortality rates as high as 90%.
Dengue has now become endemic in most of the tropical world, and is becoming
an important public health threat in the United States. A second infection from
an unrelated dengue virus subtype can be life-threatening, resulting in dengue
hemorrhagic fever (DHF) or dengue shock syndrome (DSS). There is currently no
drug or vaccine available for dengue viruses. The worldwide market for a dengue
treatment could be possibly in the billions of dollars.
Posted February 1st, 2009
