NHS lab to launch rival to Botox in US

The health service could earn millions from a bacterial answer to lines and wrinkles

The rush by wealthy Americans to use Botox to erase their wrinkles is expected to produce a multi-million pound windfall for the NHS.

A small Government laboratory in Wiltshire is preparing to launch a rival to Botox in the US, potentially earning millions of pounds in sales and licensing revenues to help fund its work on lethal bacteria and obscure tropical diseases.

The rival British treatment, marketed as Dysport, is made by the Centre for Advanced Microbiology and Research (CAMR), a Department of Health laboratory based near the Porton Down biological defence complex.

Botox injections help to reduce lines and furrows in the skin. The solution injected is actually a purified form of botulinum toxin A. The injections work by stopping nerves from sending signals to muscles that normally contract in areas underlying lines, creases or furrows.

Since its launch in 2000, Botox has become the fastest growing treatment in the cosmetics industry, reaching sales of more than $100m (£69m) last year. Celebrities such as Anne Robinson and Cliff Richard have boasted of its virtues, spawning "Botox parties" in homes.

Dysport is already sold in Britain and Europe by a French-owned pharmaceutical company, Ipsen, mainly as a medical treatment for muscle spasm disorders, with sales of £32m last year.

In the next few weeks, Ipsen and its US partner, Inamed, will start talks with the US Food & Drug Administration on a timetable for clinical trials of the treatment. It hopes to begin selling Dysport under a new brand name by late 2003.

CAMR is coy about its income from Dysport, but industry analysts claim that significant profits can be made. Dysport is sold on the NHS for £329 for two 500 unit vials, but Harley Street surgeries charge at least £200 per treatment and generally use only 50 units for each treatment.

Nick Parkhouse, the editor of the British Journal of Plastic Surgery and a user of Dysport, said it could take off in the US. "The only problem is that everyone knows of Botox, but it's a massive market. I think they can do it," he said.