Nov 29, 2023
Dr. Jim Woody, CEO and Director of 180 Life Sciences, discusses the company's vision for safer pain and inflammation management. Their earlier work on anti-TNF therapy revolutionized the treatment of conditions such as rheumatoid arthritis. Now 180 Life Sciences focuses on additional indications of inflammation, fibrosis, and cognitive dementia for using anti-TNFs. Jim highlights their research on the anti-inflammatory and analgesic properties of cannabinoids and the potential of synthetic cannabinoid analogs for pain management and appetite suppression.
Jim elaborates, "Many years ago, I was Chief Scientific Officer at a company called Centocore, and they were one of the first companies developing therapeutic monoclonal antibodies. One of them that we developed was called anti-TNF. It was Infliximab, which was the FDA name that it received. In your body, circulating around, there are hundreds of small proteins. Those that modify the immune system are called cytokines, and most of them are good actors. One of the bad actors is what they call tumor necrosis factor. It was given that name because of some mouse studies in cancer that were done, although they turned out to be incorrect."
"My colleagues in the UK, Dr. Marc Feldmann and Dr. Ravinder Maini had data suggesting that rheumatoid arthritis inflammation and pain were driven by TNF. We were the first to treat ten patients with anti-TNF in this program, in the whole world. Now, anti-TNF is the therapy of choice for rheumatoid arthritis, which, of course, is severe inflammation of the joints."
"We also found out that TNF was driving these inflammations in Crohn's disease, Psoriasis, and in Ulcerative Colitis. We discovered all of those from Centocore, and now anti-TNF is the largest-selling class of biologics, at almost $40 billion a year. The current favorite is Humira from AbbVie, but J&J, who bought Centocore, still makes a billion dollars a year from Infliximab sales or its brand name Remicade."
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