Heparin, a popular medication for blood thinning, is obtained from the intestines of pigs and its use comes with some safety concerns. Researchers from the University of Copenhagen have now reported being able to produce the drug in a safer way without using the animals.
Pigs
Millions of patients around the world depend on the drug heparin to maintain their health. But the production is costly and there is a risk of adverse effects from using it, partly due to its source.
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In a new study published in the journal Science Advances, scientists have demonstrated that it is possible to produce a safer alternative that does not involve using pig intestines in a laboratory.
The research holds the promise that medications obtained from these animals may be phased out at some point.
Heparin production dilemma
According to researchers, the most costly part of pigs is the portion of their intestines that is used for blood-thinning medications. It is expensive because animals numbering roughly 2,000 are needed to make just one kilogram of heparin. That single kilogram can supply medication for as many as 6,000 patients.
Specifically, heparin comes from that part of the pig intestine often called the mucosa.
An estimate has it that around one billion pigs provide intestines for the production of heparin every year. China is the main producer of the drug, with Chinese food pigs supplying the most intestines.
There is a very high demand for heparin as millions of patients require it. There is a drive to increase production to meet this demand and this often leads to quality control issues.
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Some heparin stocks obtained from Chinese pigs had to be recalled back in 2008 due to contamination. But that was not before more than 100 patients in the United States had died as a result.
Even with the risk of contamination, there is currently a shortage in the supply of heparin. This is because swine flu has greatly reduced the number of pigs bred in China.
There exists synthetic heparin that could be used for the treatment of patients. However, dosing is a challenge and overdose is a risk.
These challenges make the possibility of making heparin without using live animals an exciting prospect.
A cleaner and better alternative
Putting aside the risk of contamination, drugs similarly obtained from animals as heparin mostly do not have a uniform chemical structure. This makes them likely to cause side effects, which could be severe or grave in rare cases.
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Researchers said that the new technology used in this study will offer help in getting rid of observed issues. The team successfully produced heparin in a laboratory relying on just the technology without using pig intestines.
“We show that we can do it in the laboratory, i.e. in a so-called ‘cell factory,’ in the same way as many other types of medicine are made,” said Associate Professor Rebecca Miller, who led the research. “It is a step in the direction of the development that has also happened in insulin, which was previously extracted from the pancreas in pigs before we learned to produce it in the laboratory.”
Richard Karlsson, who is the main author of the study, said their technology presents a way to make clean and uniform heparin. The drug produced using it will have similar therapeutic effects as heparin which is currently available for the treatment of patients.
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Karlsson expressed hope that the product made using this new technology will possibly not cause any of the common side effects linked to animal-derived medications, let alone the life-threatening ones.
The researchers, who are from the Danish university’s Copenhagen Center for Glycomics, are now planning to improve the design they have created for making heparin. They will also be working on improving the ability to produce at a level sufficient for medical uses.
References
Dissecting structure-function of 3-O-sulfated heparin and engineered heparan sulfates
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