Science / Medicine : MS Researchers Test Protein Pills

Two studies hope to discover if a capsule of nerve proteins swallowed once a day can stop the usually relentless course of multiple sclerosis, an Ohio researcher said last week. The capsule would be filled with myelin protein, a substance that is eaten away in MS victims by an autoimmune process in which the body attacks the myelin in the nerve system.

Multiple sclerosis usually leads to loss of muscular control, affecting speech and mobility. It strikes about 250,000 Americans each year.

Carol Whitacre of Ohio State University said a test of oral MS therapy involving 30 patients has just ended at Harvard and another one will soon begin for 120 patients at Ohio State.

Whitacre told a briefing sponsored by the Council for the Advancement of Science Writing that studies of mice suffering from a disease that is a model for MS in humans show that oral therapy works even in mice that already have the disease.