Pharma Stocks In News - Weekly Roundup

(RTTNews) - The week ended April 23 did not bring good tidings to the lone company which faced the FDA panel - Acura Pharmaceuticals Inc. (ACUR), as its share price got hammered on thumbs down votes for its investigational pain drug Acurox. But the week did cheer up a few other pharma stocks and here's a list of some of them.

Shares of Melbourne-based Prana Biotechnology Ltd. (PRAN: News ) touched a new intraday high of $3.35 on Monday before closing the day's trading at $2.41, making it to the list of top gainers of that day.

The company is focused on developing disease modifying therapeutics for the treatment of common neurological disorders, particularly Alzheimer's, Parkinson's and Huntington's disease.

On April 19, the authoritative scientific journal, Journal of Alzheimer's Disease, published an article about the company's lead drug candidate for Alzheimer's disease, PBT2, providing new analysis that it is effective in reversing dementia symptoms.

PBT2 has completed two phase I trials and a phase IIa clinical trial in patients with mild Alzheimer's disease. The phase IIa results of PBT2 published in the The Lancet Neurology in July 2008 and July 2009, showed that patients with mild Alzheimer's Disease treated with 250mg of PBT2, experienced an overall statistically significant improvement in executive function on a Neuropsychological Test Battery, or NTB, within 12 weeks of treatment.

Improvements in executive function is strongly related to improvement in daily function and to the quality of the daily life of patients, said Jeffrey Cummings, Director, Alzheimer Disease Research Center, UCLA, and Chairman of Prana's Scientific Advisory Board.

According to Colin Masters of the Mental Health Research Institute and internationally acknowledged leader in Alzheimer's Disease research, the new results are very exciting and Prana's therapeutic strategy stands up as one of the safest and most effective means of treating the disease.

A definitive phase IIb trial of PBT2, which will involve 525 patients with mild to moderate Alzheimer's disease, is expected to be commenced before the end of this year. The company is in discussions with potential sources of finance for the upcoming trial, both with investors and pharmaceutical partners.

The company's preclinical compounds include PBT519, a brain cancer compound and several Parkinson's disease candidates, including PBT434.

Being a development-stage company, Prana has had no sales income to date, and as of December 31, 2009, had an accumulated deficit of A$75.78 million.

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