Politics professor's company fights SARS

Donald Drakeman GS '88, politics professor and former lawyer, is now at the forefront of developing a treatment for Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome.

His company, Princeton-based pharmaceutical business Medarex, joined forces with the Massachusetts Biologic Laboratories of the University of Massachusetts Medical School late last month to create wholly human antibodies to SARS.

SARS — a respiratory illness that has recently been reported in Europe, Asia and North America — has as of yesterday caused more than 6,500 cases and close to 500 deaths, according to the World Health Organization.

"We believe that development of a fully human neutralizing antibody to the SARS virus may be a relatively rapid approach to obtain an agent that can limit the disease in infected and exposed individuals," said Israel Lowy, director of infectious diseases at Medarex, in a press release.

Drakeman and Mark Shelton of the UMass press office said the lab and the company were compatible because of their similar research in genetic engineering.

The MBL is the only nonprofit Food and Drug Administration-licensed manufacturer of vaccines and other biologic products in the United States, according to a press release on Medarex's website. Medarex's UltiMAb Human Antibody Developing System combines many antibody technologies. UltiMAb antibodies are created by "knocking out" the genes in mice that code for antibodies and replacing them with genes that code for human antibodies. MBL's research in antibodies is a "technological match" for Medarex's similar work with human antibodies, Shelton said.

The human body has an "antigen-sensing" system. Once the foreign body is recognized and identified using a "library" of antigen data, the appropriate immune response will be created by the antibodies, such as the destruction of potentially harmful "invaders," Shelton said.

Shelton said the Centers for Disease Control "has been very aggressive" in its efforts to combat SARS. The CDC has provided a sample of the SARS virus to the UMass Medical School to help create antibodies, according to the press release.

Despite help from the CDC, there will still be administrative and financial obstacles.

Drakeman said it is "never possible to predict for sure" when treatment will be ready for use and available on the market.

Both the virus' complexity and the FDA's stringent safety requirements may delay any drug's availability, Drakeman said.

Much care must be taken so that treatments will not have adverse effects on those suffering from SARS. Because the investment is in human capital, Drakeman says that biopharmaceutical companies, such as Medarex, have to "spend money on many products before one of them is approved."

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According to Drakeman, it is "very hard to know" if the SARS epidemic will become a larger problem. Usually the fear is that treatment for a virus will not be created before a major crisis occurs. However, Drakeman said, "the fastest thing that can be done is to contain the virus." He said suitable measures, such as restricting study abroad programs for college students, have already been taken to contain the disease.

Preventive measures

As for preventive measures, Shelton suggests avoiding areas that the WHO believes are high-risk. If you are going to be in such an area, he suggests frequent hand-washing and steering clear of places where there is a great deal of coughing or sneezing.

Drakeman, who earned a doctorate in the University's Department of Religion, is the chairman of the advisory council for the James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions and has served as a part-time lecturer in the politics department.

Though the company he leads is currently creating a treatment for SARS, he believes it is "better not to get [SARS] than to rely on treatment or [a] vaccine."