Diabetes and obesity currently threaten the health, well-being and economic welfare of virtually every country in the world. Today, over 150 million people are suffering from diabetes worldwide while over 300 million people are estimated to be obese. As a result, up to 1.7 billion of the world’s population is at an increased risk of other life-threatening diseases such as heart attack and stroke. (Source: World Health Organization)

OSI’s efforts in the area of metabolic diseases are focused on developing innovative products for the treatment of Type 2 diabetes and obesity. The product pipeline currently supports several active programs.

R&D Capability
OSI’s diabetes and obesity R & D programs are conducted through Prosidion Limited, our wholly-owned U.K. subsidiary. Our core competencies comprise expertise in the Research & Development of novel therapies for diabetes and obesity. In Research, core competencies include assay development, in-vitro diabetes biology, bioanalysis and ADME, high throughput screening, medicinal and scale-up and computational chemistry, and molecular modeling. Development competencies include all preclinical disciplines, CMC and clinical development. OSI will focus its small molecule chemistry on validated, as well as novel, drug targets. Accelerated development strategies, having the potential to reduce development time from lead molecule identification to proof of concept in patients, will be used to speed product candidates to market.

OSI’s efforts in the area of metabolic diseases are focused on developing innovative products for the treatment of Type 2 diabetes and obesity.

Pre-clinical and Clinical Programs
OSI has several pre-clinical and clinical programs, all of which are novel therapeutic approaches to tackling Type 2 diabetes or obesity. The programs include GPCR and enzyme targets. PSN821 has been selected as a product candidate from the GPR119 agonist project for the treatment of Type 2 diabetes and obesity. PSN602, a novel monoamine reuptake inhibitor and serotonin-1A agonist, is being developed for the long term treatment of obesity.

About Type 2 Diabetes
Diabetes mellitus is a metabolic disorder characterized by high levels of glucose in the blood. There are more than 150 million people with diabetes worldwide, with the number expected to reach 300 million by 2025, with approximately 90% having type 2 diabetes. In type 2 diabetes, the high blood glucose level is caused by impairment of the body’s ability to produce insulin in response to glucose, together with impairment of insulin’s effectiveness in stimulating glucose uptake by skeletal muscle and other tissues. The high blood glucose levels, in turn, may lead to organ damage involving the kidneys (diabetic nephropathy), nervous system (diabetic neuropathy), eyes (diabetic retinopathy) and circulatory system.

About Obesity
Obesity is a state of excess body fat. The World Health Organization expresses the prevalence of obesity by using body mass index (BMI), a simple index of weight-for-height that classifies underweight, overweight and obesity in adults. Obesity has reached epidemic proportions globally with more than 1 billion adults overweight, of which at least 300 million are clinically obese. Excess weight and obesity lead to adverse metabolic effects on blood pressure, lipid levels and insulin resistance and thus pose a major risk for serious chronic diseases, including hypertension, type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease. In addition, obesity increases the risk of respiratory difficulties, chronic musculoskeletal problems, infertility, gallbladder disease, and certain forms of cancer. Obesity-related conditions account for 2-6% of total health care costs in several developed countries with some estimates putting the figure as high as 7%.

Further information about diabetes and about obesity can be found on the websites of the two major diabetes organizations, the American Diabetes Association (www.diabetes.org*) and the European Association for the Study of Diabetes (www.easd.org*).

* These websites are not endorsed by OSI, and OSI is not responsible for their content.