Tuesday, November 22 2005 19:57 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

Bangalore: Pharma major Astra Zeneca will come out with the 'candidate drug' for treatment of Tuberculosis by 2007, a top official of the company said.

"Among the different stages in the drug process, candidate drug is definite stage, we hope to arrive at this by 2007 and identify the molecule by 2010", Lars Walan, Vice-President, Global Drug Development R&D Molndal Sweden, told reporters during the visit of Swedish Royal Technology mission led by King Carl XVI Gustaf to the Bangalore facility.

"Around the world 3 million people are dying of TB and every 15 seconds a person is succumbing to it. We are aiming at getting the best compound out which will simplify and shorten the duration of treatment to about 2 months at affordable prices", he said.

The drug will also be compatible with the treatment of HIV since close to 50 per cent of HIV cases die of tuberculosis, Bhaskar Iyer Managing Director Astra Zeneca Pharma India Limited, said.

The Bangalore Research Facility which opened in 2003 is dedicated to finding a new therapy that will act in drug resistant disease. Astra Zeneca is the only pharmaceutical company with a research programme in India totally dedicated to TB, Walan said.

As part of its expansion plan in Bangalore, a new 12 million US$ state-of-the-art R&D facility will be integrated into the exisiting facility by Nov 2006, Ulf Kruger, Associate Director/PR&D Project Manager AZ Sweden/India said.

The integrated facility will support the initial development of candidate drugs, secure efficient cost and quality control and support increasing pharmaceutical activities in Asia, Kruger said.

"In the total 5 billion US$ pharma industry in India, we are ranked the 30th while we occupy the 8th position among global MNCs in India", Bhasker Iyer said.

In volume terms, Astra Zeneca is the fourth largest global pharma in the country and in value terms "we are 13th in the Indian market as less than 1 per cent of Indian population is covered by private health insurance", he said.

Astra is "The fastest growing MNC in India and hopes to be number one by 2007", Iyer said.

In India, Astra Zeneca's presence includes Astra Zeneca Pharma Limited (AZPIL), the marketing company with products in six major therapeutic areas-oncology, , maternal healthcare, infection, respiratory and neuroscience and a manufacturing unit conforming to WHO current Good Manufacturing Practices (GMP).