Marketing Agreement for Prion Filter

A strategic alliance has been announced that will focus on the marketing and further development of products for the selective adsorption of prions and viruses from blood and blood-derived products.

Pathogen Removal and Diagnostic Technologies, Inc. (PRDT), a joint venture of ProMetic Life Sciences (Cambridge, UK) and the American Red Cross (Washington, DC, USA) have formed an alliance with MacoPharma (Lille, France), a large distributor of blood collection bag sets, to market the first commercially available prion filter for red blood cells.

PRDT scientists have identified lead ligands capable of specifically targeting certain types of viruses that remain a challenge to the blood industry. The company's prion-removal ligands are the only products that address the selective adsorption of infectious prion proteins, states ProMetic. The ligands were shown to be successful in preliminary studies. The product line may ultimately target a number of viruses by the onsite filtration of donor blood supplies in blood transfusion centers, in order to reduce the risk of transmission of viruses such as West Nile virus and hepatitis C.

"PRDT's technology is an innovative breakthrough for the blood industry, and our market position in Europe will be consolidated,” said Herve Dubly, president of MacoPharma.





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