Monday May 21, 2007

                                                    BIOTECH DAILY

                       Daily news on ASX-listed biotechnology companies

HATCHTECH
Hatchtech’s head lice control product Deovo has completed its first human trials finding no
side effects or other adverse events.
Thirty-two patients were treated at escalating dose levels and monitored by observation,
blood tests and electrocardiography.
Hatchtech described Deovo “a low-toxicity ovicide” or egg-killer. It is a metallo-proteinase
inhibitor interrupting insect life cycle changes.
The company said it was effective against eggs and/or larvae of lice, fleas, house dust
mites and nematodes.
Hatchtech chief executive officer Dr Paul MacLeman said most other insecticidal products
“have not shown this level of human safety”.
“We also believe that the Deovo product will eventually be the most effective anti-head lice
product on the market despite some significant milestones still to come on our path to
market,” Dr MacLeman said.
The trial was conducted by Q-Pharm in Queensland from February to April 2007.
Hatchtech intends to file an investigational new drug application with the US Food and
Drug Administration later in 2007 in preparation for a phase II trial in an affected patient
population in early 2008.
Hatchtech’s crop protection product is currently undergoing boom-spray scale plant safety
and efficacy studies in greenhouse trials at the South Australian Research and
Development Institute, having demonstrated safety in screening mammalian toxicity tests
late in 2006.
Further laboratory work towards new products continues in a range of other important
veterinary, industrial and household pest species. Rising resistance levels in pest
populations and concerns about safety continue to drive demand for new products in all
these sectors.
Hatchtech is an unlisted company.


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