Ms. Bayko: I cover a variety of different companies within this space with a focus on oncology. My coverage starts there and then branches out to companies with lifestyle drugs, products in blood safety and infectious disease agents. That's the platform at a glance.
TWST: Let's start with oncology. What's the direction that you see at this
point?
Ms. Bayko: Within oncology, I think there is a major focus on the so-called
targeted therapies. Traditional chemotherapy involves generally broad spectrum
cytotoxic agents that kill a host of rapidly dividing cells which, while killing
the rapidly growing tumor, leads to unwanted side effects such as hair loss,
etc. On the other hand, targeted agents exploit abnormalities in the expression
of certain proteins. This class of compounds really tries to exploit the
difference between normal and tumor cells, thereby attacking the tumor in a more
specific way than broad-spectrum cytotoxic drugs.
The first targeted agent antibody was approved in 1998 and since then many
industry players have been focused in this area. This enables the use of
diagnostics to identify what has gone wrong that has caused you to have this
tumor, such as genetic differences, differences in expression of certain
proteins, etc., and then actually pick a targeted therapy that will specifically
attack that change. I think that's where the industry is going, but the concept
is still in its infancy.
Tickers included in this excerpt: CERS, DNDN, HGSI, PTN, SGEN
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