"We
remain in close and constant contact with the Northwick Park
Hospital concerning the medical status of the six
volunteers."
Dr
Suntharalingam, head of intensive care, said: "Some of them
have made noticeable progress in response to our treatment
and we have been able to reduce the amount of organ support
that is required.
"However, it is early days and they will clearly still
continue to need specialist observation for some
considerable time.
"There are also some very early signs of response to
treatment in the most critically ill patients but I must
stress that their condition remains very serious and complex
and it wouldn't be sensible to comment on prognosis."
On
Friday, Labour MP for Brent North, Barry Gardiner, visited
the North West London Hospital Trust chief executive Mary
Wells, and said there was no better place for the patients
to be treated.
He
added it was unclear how long the inquiry by the UK
medicines watchdog would take.
The
Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA)
is investigating whether the reaction suffered by the men
was caused by a manufacturing problem, contamination, a
dosing error or whether it was some "completely
unanticipated side-effect of the drug in humans".
Mr
Gardiner said: "MHRA has sealed the offices of Parexel,
bagged and taken away all the relevant information, is
conducting interviews with Parexel and with their staff."
Speaking to the BBC on Thursday, Lord Winston, a fertility
expert, rejected claims regulation of clinical testing of
new drugs was "weak and ramshackle".
The
professor of fertility studies at Imperial College London
and vice-chairman of the Parliamentary Office for Science
and Technology, said Britain's system of clinical trials had
"lots of safeguards".
He
was responding to concerns raised earlier by Paul Flynn MP.
"I
think it's really unfortunate that there might be given an
impression that our very ethical drug industry is actually
not working according to proper practice because I think on
the whole it undoubtedly is," he said.
He
said he was concerned about growing resistance to animal
testing.
He
said: "I wonder really whether in fact there's increasing
reluctance to do the preliminary trials on animals because
of the difficulties generally in doing animal research.
"That I think is a disaster for humans."
'Tested on monkeys'
TeGenero, which manufactures the drug, apologised to the
sick men's families and said the medicine had shown no signs
of problems in earlier tests.
The
company's chief scientific officer, Thomas Hanke, said he
and his colleagues were "devastated" by what had happened.
He
said TGN1412 had been tested extensively in laboratories and
on rabbits and monkeys, with no adverse effects and no
drug-related deaths.
It
was the first time the drug, designed to treat conditions
such as rheumatoid arthritis, leukaemia and multiple
sclerosis, had been tested on humans.
Scotland Yard said officers were talking to the MHRA and
doctors.
