Availability of LC Detect(sm) EARLY DETECTION PROGRAM

[RandyW]

Panacea Pharmaceuticals Announces the Availability of LC Detect(sm), a Serum-Based Diagnostic Test for Lung Cancer

GAITHERSBURG, Md., July 17 /PRNewswire/ -- Panacea Pharmaceuticals,

Inc. announced today that LC Detect(sm), the Company's serum-based lung

cancer diagnostic test, is now available from Panacea Laboratories. LC

Detect(sm) is a simple blood test which should facilitate the

identification of lung cancer, even among individuals with early-stage

disease. Panacea Laboratories, a division of Panacea Pharmaceuticals, is

certified under the Clinical Laboratory Improvement Amendments of 1988

(CLIA). The blood sample can be ordered by any physician and sent to

Panacea for testing; sample and shipping requirements are available at

http://www.panacea-labs.com.

Lung cancer accounts for the highest number of cancer deaths worldwide,

in both men and women. An estimated 213,380 new cases of cancer involving

the lung or bronchus are expected in the U.S. in 2007, accounting for about

15 percent of total cancer diagnoses. An estimated 160,390 deaths,

accounting for about 29 percent of all cancer deaths, are expected to occur

in 2007. Since 1987, more women have died each year from lung cancer than

from breast cancer. Lung cancer was the third most common cancer for men

and the fifth most common cancer for women in Japan in 2000. The five-year

survival rate for lung cancer is only 15 percent. Survival rates for

individuals in whom lung cancer is detected at an early stage while it

remains localized are as high as 50 percent. Current screening and

detection methods rely on imaging modalities, primarily chest x-ray and CT

scanning. However, chest x-ray is not sufficiently sensitive and CT

scanning is expensive with only a moderate improvement in sensitivity.

Newer tests, such as low-dose spiral computed tomography scans and

molecular markers in sputum have not proven to be useful to date.

LC Detect(sm) measures levels of human aspartyl (asparaginyl) Beta-

hydroxylase (HAAH), a cancer molecular marker, in blood. HAAH has been

detected by immunohistochemical staining in a broad range of cancers,

including lung cancer, and has been shown to be highly specific and absent

in adjacent non-affected tissue as well as tissue from cancer-free

individuals. In addition, HAAH protein levels in serum have been

demonstrated to be highly sensitive and specific for cancer in hundreds of

patients with a range of cancer types, including lung cancer. Panacea has

found increased levels of HAAH in the serum of 99 percent of patients with

lung cancer (n=160), including those with early-stage disease. In

individuals not known to have cancer, HAAH was essentially undetectable in

serum (n=93, specificity = 91 percent). In a population of 50 smokers not

known to have cancer the mean serum HAAH level was 0 ng/ml.

"Identification of elevated serum HAAH protein levels using LC

Detect(sm), in conjunction with chest x-ray, CT scanning and other imaging

modalities, should greatly facilitate the identification of individuals

with lung cancer at an earlier stage when treatment may lead to improved

outcomes and survival," commented Pamela Jo Harris, MD, Vice President,

Medical and Clinical Affairs at Panacea. "We are confident that LC

Detect(sm) will help internists, family practitioners, and pulmonologists

more effectively screen individuals at high risk of developing lung

cancer."

About Panacea's Oncology Platform

In addition to LC Detect(sm), Panacea offers, PC Detect(sm), a

diagnostic test used in conjunction with PSA and digital rectal exam to

identify patients with prostate cancer, and TK Sense(sm), which determines

whether white blood cells from patients with chronic myelogenous leukemia

(CML) are sensitive or resistant to imatinib, the therapy of first choice

for CML patients, prior to initiation of therapy.

The HAAH serum assay will be further developed as a diagnostic test for

other types of cancer. Panacea is also pursuing the development of

antibodies directed against HAAH as novel agents for the treatment of

cancer with liver cancer as the first therapeutic indication. The Company

is exploring both naked anti-HAAH antibodies as well as HAAH antibodies

conjugated to chemotherapeutic agents and toxins.