The Adelaide company's head of MS drug development, Jorgen Mould, told the World Congress of Neuroscience in Melbourne yesterday that preclinical data showed the drug BNC245 was effective in a rat model of MS.

The studies showed BNC245, given over several days, had no side effects and was as effective as one of the common steroid anti-inflammatory drugs.

MS is the result of damage caused to a fatty layer known as the myelin sheath that surrounds neurons in the brain and the spinal cord.

This damage slows down or blocks messages between the brain and the rest of the body.

Dr Mould said the most common MS treatments were a class of drugs called interferons which are administered by injection.

However, these MS drugs generally had side effects such as flu-like reactions and reactions at the site of the injection like redness, inflammation and pain.

As well, patients who were on these drugs for long terms sometimes developed resistance.

Dr Mould said BNC245 could be developed into a tablet which would have a huge advantage over current injectable drugs.

Because BNC245 acts specifically on cells linked to auto-immune disease and could be taken orally by patients, it would not have the side effects of site reactions or flu-like symptoms, he said.

"We carried out a number of preclinical tests which showed that BNC245 was as effective as a common anti-inflammatory drug used to treat MS symptoms, but it did not have the negative side effects," Dr Mould said. "We are . . . targeting a novel pathway that underlies MS and a number of other auto-immune diseases."

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