A DNA vaccine for multiple sclerosis

Abstract

Background: Multiple sclerosis (MS) is a disease in which safety is of paramount importance when developing a potential therapeutic. Antigen-specific treatments provide a method for achieving efficacy while maintaining safety. DNA vaccines are one such form of treatment that have been tested in clinical trials Objective: To determine if a DNA vaccine is a viable method of antigen-specific treatment of MS. Results/conclusion: Phase I and II trials of BHT-3009, a DNA vaccine encoding myelin basic protein, demonstrated that it was safe, well-tolerated, and caused antigen-specific immune tolerance. BHT-3009 showed efficacy in reducing brain lesion activity as well as clinical relapses in patients that were immunologically active at baseline. BHT-3009 is a promising therapy in development for MS, and may prove to be one of the first antigen-specific treatments for this disease.

Keywords::

• BHT3009
• DNA vaccine
• multiple sclerosis
• myelin basic protein

Acknowledgements

The author gratefully acknowledges the contributions of Stanford University colleagues Lawrence Steinman, William Robinson and PJ Utz, who were involved in the discovery and development of DNA vaccines for autoimmune disease, as well as all of the investigators involved in the Phase I and II trials of BHT-3009.