Immutep drug doubles breast cancer response

French drug developer Immutep has reported that its ImmuFact IMP321 plus paclitaxel showed a statistically-significant response rate of 50%  compared to 25% with paclitaxel alone (p=0.03) in the interim results of  an ongoing Phase I/II chemo-immunotherapy trial in metastatic breast  carcinoma.

In the multicenter, open-label, fixed dose-escalation trial, patients  receive six cycles of low-dose weekly paclitaxel at day one, eight and  15 of a four-week cycle as first-line chemotherapy plus bi-weekly IMP321  administered the day after the paclitaxel to make a total of 12  injections of IMP321 over 24 weeks. Three dose levels of the drug are  being studied in three cohorts of eight patients each.

"These positive results have encouraged us to engage in discussions with  potential partners over Immutep's plans for the advanced development  stages of IMP321 as we continue to collect data from this study at the  highest dose," said chief executive John Hawken.