Skye Bioscience Inc., a pharmaceutical company developing drugs targeting the endocannabinoid system, and Tautomer Bioscience (Pty) Limited (“Tautomer”), a privately-owned biopharmaceutical company focused on addressing unmet medical needs in oncology, pain management and infectious diseases, announced today that they have entered into an agreement under which Skye is providing Tautomer with an exclusive license to develop and commercialize Skye’s proprietary THC prodrug, SBI-100, as a novel suppository application for chronic intractable pain and other indications (“Tautomer Products”) in South Africa and the rest of Africa.
There is growing evidence and interest in the role of the endocannabinoid system, in particular activation of the CB1 receptor (“CB1”), for the treatment of chronic pain. Multiple medical reviews have demonstrated that cannabis use can alleviate pain symptoms while potentially reducing or even substituting opioid and non-opioid pharmacologic pain treatments. Importantly, CB1 is highly expressed in areas of the brain and spinal cord associated with pain as well as in the dorsal root ganglia of the peripheral nervous system. With this widespread distribution of these receptors in such critical pain-processing regions, it has long been postulated that cannabinoids such as THC can directly modulate pain. However, the presence of bioavailability and safety issues, including THC’s psychotropic side effects, associated with previously used methods of delivery have in the past considerably hampered the development of cannabinoids to treat chronic pain. There is a need for pharmaceutical dosage forms that deliver the therapeutic effects of THC and minimize adverse effects.
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