Bayer to use tobacco to produce medicines

Bayer has announced that it has started work on the first development candidate from tobacco plants for the treatment of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma.

Together with its subsidiary Icon Genetics, the company has developed a production process to manufacture biotechnology drugs in tobacco plants, with clinical trials potentially starting in 2009.

Bayer has invested over ten million euros (eight million pounds) at the Halle site in Saxony-Anhalt and a new production facility was inaugurated there earlier this week.

Currently, 26 employees work in laboratories and greenhouses at the Halle Biocentre on the development of biotech active substances produced in plants that could potentially be used to treat cancer or as a vaccine for influenza.

Dr Wolfgang Plischke, a member of the board of management of Bayer, said: “This project is intended to improve our chances of finding new therapies for life-threatening diseases by using drugs obtained with biotechnological methods.”

He added that cancers are different, some requiring treatment with specific active substances, while the company hoping to use its production process to make customised drugs for each patient.

Last week, Bayer published its latest sustainable development report and noted a 37 per cent reduction in carbon emissions since 1990.