AFTER more than three decades of research and spending millions on an anti-HIV drug derived from the Bintangor tree, Sarawak Assistant Minister for Science and Technological Research, Annuar Rapaee, said the state government should now look for a collaborative partner for clinical trials of the drug.

“I think the state government should no longer be directly involved as there is a huge amount of money involved.

“We should seek a (pharmaceutical) company as collaborative partner to complete the (final) clinical trials,” he said when asked what the research had yielded to date.

The research on the anti-HIV drug started in Sarawak in 1987 when a National Cancer Institute-sponsored expedition in Sarawak collected samples of the Calophyllum lanigerum var austrocoriaceum – a rare member of the mangosteen family. The compound Calanolide A is derived from a Bintangor tree in a forest in Lundu.

Annuar said the Calanolide A compound could now be produced in the laboratory synthetically.

“Since the compound has already been synthesised, we don’t tree the tree any more.”

He said researchers had completed pre-clinical trials on animals and stages 1A and 1B clinical trials on humans.

Only three more stages, he said, had yet to be completed before the drug could be certified for human consumption and be produced commercially.

“The tests in the clinical trials have shown positive results,” Annuar said after presenting prizes to winners of a silat competition in Kuching this afternoon.

He however, admitted the time it had taken in the research was too long.

“In production of drugs, the essence is time.

“If you are too slow, someone would have created their own drugs.

“Since there is no drug to treat HIV, a lot of pharmaceutical companies have been rushing to find the drug.”

Annuar said he hoped the research would not have a long way to go on a new track with a collaborative partner. – October 20, 2019.