Consideration should be given to the Isle of Man becoming a centre for increasingly important therapies which include new approaches to cancer treatment and would attract offshore patients as well as benefiting the whole community.
This was the main thrust of a speech delivered by Professor David Onions, a founder and president of Q-One Biotech, which was acquired by Life Technology Corporation where Prof Onions became the chief medical officer.
He was one of two guest speakers at an inaugural dining club event held at the Sefton Hotel organised by the Institute of Directors Isle of Man and hosted by its chairman Clive Parrish. The other speaker was Courtenay Heading, BioMed inward investment consultant to the Isle of Man Government.
The subject under discussion by the guests, who were limited to IoD members, was ‘The Personal Medicine Revolution: A Role for the Isle of Man’. Both speakers outlined the potential for the Isle of Man’s economy of such a ‘revolution’ and the benefits it could bring in improved health care for the community and beyond.
Prof Onions predicted that new approaches to cancer treatment like CAR-T, which involve modifying a patient’s white blood cells to fight cancer, are going to become increasingly important. He said the onset of genetic engineering, one of ‘two main revolutions’,had enabled the production of a new class of protein drugs.
“The three biggest selling drugs in the world are now proteins called monoclonal antibodies; these are used to treat cancer and conditions like arthritis and psoriasis, collectively they have worldwide sales of over a $100 billion a year. The second revolution is the development of personalised genomic information and the first human genome was completed in 2000 after a 15-year programme costing over $1 billion.
“Costs have fallen dramatically and now a human genome can be sequenced for $1000 and by 2017 it will have fallen to $100. Integrating data from genomic information with patients’ records will help drive the next phase of personalised medicine for instance, by ensuring a particular drug will be effective and non-toxic.”
Courtenay Heading spoke of his role at the more local level of working with on-island biomed companies as well as making the Island a preferred destination to attract international medical and health thought leaders. He emphasised that his key focus is to increase Manx employment at all levels in the biomed sector.
“An increasing focus will be on cross-departmental working, leading to better health outcomes, at lower cost,” he added. “Much of this will be driven by better use of rapidly changing technology and ensuring that any local medical trials follow best practice and receive ethics approval.”
Both speakers answered a series of questions from guests. “I was impressed by the engagement of everybody at the dinner and the enthusiasm for getting this new area of economic activity off the ground,” said Prof Onions, who has a home on the island. In 2006 he received an honorary doctorate from the University of Glasgow for services to biotechnology and veterinary medicine.
Photo - Prof David Onions, a guest speaker at the launch of the Institute of Directors Isle of Man Dining Club, chatting with IoD member John Hunter.
