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BC-007: Successful drug against Autoantibodies helps with long COVID

elvira

Senior Member
Messages
146
Hi. Encouraging. I have some questions if anyone can answer them?

Is there a test for, "autoantibodies that attach to the G-protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs)"?

Will the research with me/CFS have selected people who have, "autoantibodies that attach to the G-protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs)"?

The Open Medicine Foundation found deformaty in the red blood cells and where going to try a lot of medications/supplements etc in their nano needle. Are they going to try BC007?

Thanks

Good questions!

I know that the Max-Delbrück-Centrum für Molekulare Medizin, Berlin have tests for this. I don’t know the process since my doctor will send the tests.
 

elvira

Senior Member
Messages
146
Hi. Encouraging. I have some questions if anyone can answer them?

Is there a test for, "autoantibodies that attach to the G-protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs)"?

Will the research with me/CFS have selected people who have, "autoantibodies that attach to the G-protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs)"?

The Open Medicine Foundation found deformaty in the red blood cells and where going to try a lot of medications/supplements etc in their nano needle. Are they going to try BC007?

Thanks

Check out this website: celltrend.de

Also read on berlincures.de that they first check for these autoantibodies before treatment with BC007.
 

RYO

Senior Member
Messages
350
Location
USA
Does anyone know if any US commercial labs offer autoantibody testing? Berlin cures website states they are no longer accepting blood tests.

• AT1-Receptor-Autoantibody

• MAS-Receptor-Autoantibody
• ß2-Receptor-Autoantibody
• M2-Receptor-Autoantibody
• Alpha-1-Receptor-Autoantibody
• ETA-Receptor-Autoantibody

 

Marylib

Senior Member
Messages
1,153
Good news on the money, @elvira. Thanks. I saw this on Dr Bettina Hohberger's twitter feed and I wonder what this study actually involves? I think the Long Covid one required vaccination before you can get BC007? That's what I picked up anyway - maybe I am wrong about this?
 

halcyon

Senior Member
Messages
2,482
https://www.dw.com/en/tracking-long...uOuVOzI0gWjt__eGeWjUrwIiRMR_tGrEtrp0xMRbpcXcg

Red blood cell deformability somehow messed up by autoantibodies.
Has any further information come to light about specifically which autoantibodies are involved in causing the poor RBC deformability in long COVID? Are they for sure a GPCR autoantibody, or could it be another target?

In order to function correctly, RBCs need to maintain a certain asymmetrical ratio/distribution of phospholipids between the inner and outer membrane. I believe this also has an impact on shape and deformability as well, though I've not found a definitive link for the latter. As this asymmetry can't be maintained passively, the cells have to use ATP-driven transmembrane lipid pump proteins (flippase for example) to shuttle them around to the right place. It seems like these lipid pump proteins could be a potential autoantibody target. If disrupted, this can cause phosphatidylserine to become externalized (scrambling), which is bad juju (can cause RBCs to stick to each other, stick to endothelial cells, and can cause them to be destroyed prematurely). This can also be caused by oxidative stress, and is mediated via ion transfer, so I also wonder if ion channels could be a potential autoantibody target too (Bissinger et al., 2018).

It's unclear to me what sort of RBC GPCR receptor could cause an alteration in RBC deformability.
 

halcyon

Senior Member
Messages
2,482
Does anyone know if any US commercial labs offer autoantibody testing? Berlin cures website states they are no longer accepting blood tests.
To my knowledge, the only commercially available autoantibody tests here are for demonstrably pathogenic autoantibodies. I don't believe that anyone has demonstrated pathogenicity in humans for the autoantibodies tested for in Germany by CellTrend, for example.
 
Messages
600
@halcyon interresting post you made, i dont know much about it though. Im thinking the effect of autoantibodies might be indirect. For example a autoantibody might be targeting some protein somewhere in the body which causes a chain of events that eventually leads to cytokine release, and these being able to demand RBCs to change deformabilty parameters. I dont know if this route is possible though.

However im linking a study below here if you havent seen it. Seems to me like deformability, form and structure of immune cells might also be affected, not just RBC. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34087216/
 
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halcyon

Senior Member
Messages
2,482
Im thinking the effect of autoantibodies might be indirect. For example a autoantibody might be targeting some protein somewhere in the body which causes a chain of events that eventually leads to cytokine release, and these being able to demand RBCs to change deformabilty parameters. I dont know if this route is possible though.
Good point, seems entirely possible. Oxidative stress and inflammation in general could simply be the answer, as RBCs soak a lot of oxidative stress from the body and don't have the capability to self repair much.

However im linking a study below here if you havent seen it. Seems to me like deformability, form and structure of immune cells might also be affected, not just RBC. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34087216/
Thank you, it looks familiar but I'll check it out again. I should say also that membrane phospholipid composition is important for all cells, and yes definitely immune cells, not just RBCs.

The reason I'm skeptical is because mature RBCs lack a nucleus, mitochondria, and other organelles, so this kind of narrows the possibilities down for direct interaction between the putative autoantibodies and RBCs from what I can tell. GPCRs work via several signaling mechanisms, one of which is via IP3 and calcium release in the cell, the latter of which absolutely can alter membrane phospholipid composition, the problem is that this signaling pathway utilizes the endoplasmic reticulum, which RBCs don't have. The other mechanism is cyclic AMP, which it does look like RBCs are responsive to, so my skepticism is probably not well founded.
 

Marylib

Senior Member
Messages
1,153
Edit: Berlin Cures has a statement in English on twitter


Oh dear, now Berlin Cures says (on twitter) that they are producing more BC007 and if it passes quality control, they will give enough for Dr Hohberger to test 30 Long Covid patients and some other Europeans. If it works, it is 'conceivable' that they will give some to test on ME patients at some point in the future. The ME patients have been raising their own funds for the purpose (as usual) so may not be happy @elvira
 
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Messages
29
A great update from the Erlangen Universty Hospital:
https://www.augenklinik.uk-erlangen...RZgRvVi10Lg1PJ56puWPY87EfmmOwgUfptKRpP5JgPJAc (in German)

They treated their first ME/CFS patient with BC007. They also found the same autoantibodies (M2-AAb and β2-AAb) as well as the changes in blood cells. According to the patients own reporting symptoms improved over months after the treatment with BC007. First brain fog, cognitive deficits, light and -sound sensivity and concentration improved. Than over several months fatigue, muscle weakness and POTS improved.
 
Messages
29
According to a report from the German long covid group on facebook:

The final pre-screening of participants for the follow-up study with 30 patients is almost finished.
Dr. Wallukat (Head of Research, Berlin Cures) and Dr. Hohberger (Erlangen Universty Hospital) were present and said that the study will start this autumn.


On a side-note. I am surprised that this treatment doesn't get more attention here. It is a highly targeted, cheap, easy to administer immunoadsorption without any of the downside of apheresis like removing all the good antibodies. It should also be possible to do repeat treatments if auto-antibodies come back and it might be even more effective in removing autoantibodies than apheresis as it works locally inside the body where it can act also on autoantibodies still attached to receptors.
 

ruben

Senior Member
Messages
282
Apologies if this has been asked before, but just how long if everything went well would it before BC007 became available to the masses.
 

Treeman

Senior Member
Messages
768
Location
York, England
Apologies if this has been asked before, but just how long if everything went well would it before BC007 became available to the masses.

I think the trails have been delayed. I think it could take several years with undelayed successful trails.
 

ruben

Senior Member
Messages
282
I think the trails have been delayed. I think it could take several years with undelayed successful trails.
Thanks for that. In all honesty I for one would be more than happy to be a guinea pig. In actual fact I'd be happy to pay them!!
 
Messages
29
The small 2nd trial with 30 patients should start this year, but it won't be enough to get general approval. The start of the bigger multi-center placebo-controlled trial is not really clear yet, but hopefully end of this year. Probably take another year for the results and after that they still need to ramp up production. Not sure how difficult this will be.
Also Berlin Cures as of recently was just a small 15 person startup.

So I am guessing 2-3 years, if trials and financing goes well.

Attached is the pipeline chart from their website.
grafik-pipeline-19.07.22.jpg
 
Messages
29
There is a new petition demanding the German government to fund an application study for BC007.
https://www.change.org/p/bc007-now-chance-auf-heilung-für-millionen-erkrankte-menschen

Please sign if you want to support it.

We call on the German government to financially support the approval studies of the company Berlin Cures GmbH for the drug BC 007 and to remove bureaucratic hurdles to enable an accelerated approval process.
We call on the German government to expand biomedical research on long-covid, ME/CFS and post-vaccine syndrome and to increase government funding for further clinical trials and appropriate therapies to at least 100 million euros for an initial period of 24 months.