Snails give speedy pain relief! By Marttyn Halle, Daily Mail
2 March 2004 Snail's venom is the unlikely source for a pain-
killing drug said to be 1,000 times more potent than
morphine, traditionally used for those suffering from
conditions such as cancer and arthritis.
Ziconotide has been synthesised from one of hundreds of
venomous sea snails that live in shallow tropical waters.
Specialists are hailing it as a breakthrough in the
treatment of pain.
Opiate-based drugs such as morphine have the drawback of
being addictive, making patients drowsy and losing their
effect if administered over a long time.
Pharmaceutical firm Elan is expected to gain approval for
ziconotide following trials in Europe and the United States.
In the latest trial - results of which were published last
month in the Journal Of The American Medical Association -
almost 60 per cent of patients receiving the drug gained
partial or full pain relief.
Doctors treating pain say that a 60 per cent score is high,
as often it is difficult to find just one drug that will
work on a patient. Patients were given ziconotide after they
had failed to respond to other treatments. The drug is
slowly released into the bloodstream through a small
infusion pump in the patient's stomach.
A major benefit is that it can be used long-term without the
dose wearing off and without it having to be increased
significantly. Scientists hope that other drugs can be
obtained from sea snails such as Conus Magnus, from which
ziconotide has been developed. And they believe that snail
venom - conotoxin - can be used to help treat other
conditions such as epilepsy and multiple sclerosis. There
are hundreds of species of sea snail and each has its own
set of toxins, which means there could be as many as 50,000
conotoxins.
Conotoxins could treat muscle spasticity following spinal
injury and epilepsy, which is resistant to traditional
medicines. A broad spectrum anti-epileptic agent is in the
first stage of clinical trials.
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