HoneyLab
Pharmaceutical and health products from bee products
HoneyLab is a science-based developer of pharmaceutical and therapeutic products based on kanuka honey, bee venom and associated raw materials. Their main products so far include Honevo™, a product applied to the skin designed to treat difficult conditions like rosacea, acne and nappy rash; Rubeeven™, which reduces joint pain and stiffness; and Kanu Bee Venom®, an anti-aging beauty gel. All comprise natural products and are based on research supported by clinical trials. Recent comprehensive clinical trials of Honevo™ have confirmed that it is a highly effective treatment for rosacea. (See information in the press release at the bottom of this article.)
NZ tea-tree honey and oil are well known for their antibacterial and therapeutic properties but most people think of manuka (Leptospermum scoparium) as the only source of these products. However, kanuka (Kunzea ericioides) is also a source and many “manuka” honeys and oils contain some kanuka raw material. Although collectively known as “tea tree” they are a distinct species with somewhat different active ingredients in their extracts.
HoneyLab Ltd was formed five years ago to make pharmaceuticals and health products from bee products. Its prime focus currently is on medical grade kanuka honey for the treatment of a variety of skin conditions, as Dr. Shaun Holt, the company’s medical director, explains. “We have looked at the research behind kanuka and it is slightly better in terms of killing bacteria and it also appears to be anti-inflammatory. We have been conducting trials of our medical grade kanuka honey, Honevo™, that is sterilised in a two-step process of filtration and pasteurisation. Raw honey is full of dead bees and bits of debris that tend to cause adverse skin reactions. We sterilise it and add an excipient that makes it less sticky on the skin and more temperature stable.”
Shaun has spent most of his medical career developing new medicines for pharmaceutical companies and he approaches HoneyLab product development in the same way. Small studies that show promise are followed up with larger clinical trials that lead to published research.
“We have had initial promising results in treating acne, nappy rash, cold sores and rosacea. Rosacea is a fairly common condition of facial redness particularly around the nose and cheeks, and it is very hard to treat. We have just completed a large trial for rosacea and the results indicate that it is as good, if not better than current pharmaceuticals and with fewer side effects” he says.
“We are also about to start one of the largest-ever studies of cold sores, which afflicts about a third of the population regularly. Indications are that Honevo™ will be far superior to what is on the market at the moment.”
“For treating rosacea and acne the Honevo™ product is put on as a ‘mask’ over the affected area for 30 minutes twice a day and then washed off. The trials showed some great results within two weeks and even better results within eight weeks”, says Shaun.
“To put that into perspective, there is no cure for rosacea at the moment and most people with it are on antibiotics either as tablets or creams for months on end,” he says. “We had a substantial number, about 15%, that had total remission during their time on the trial. Their rosacea disappeared.”
The company is also focusing on applications for other common skin conditions, such as cold sores, which afflict one person in three at some time, and nappy rash that just about every baby gets.
A quality assurance protocol for kanuka honey, one of several that are used, measures its ‘total activity’, a test that compares antimocrobial strength with that of phenol. This is applied to honeys supplied mainly from around the Bay of Plenty and Coromandel.
“The exciting thing is that stands of kanuka, which have traditionally been seen as a waste of land and something that should be chopped down for firewood, are potentially a very valuable source of medical grade honey,” says Shaun. “We’re now talking with Maori landowners and have started to do some deals with them. Some have actually invested in the company, which is great, and we hope this will be a big boost to the local economy.”
Collection and initial processing of the kanuka honey is carried out by beekeepers such as Buzz Apiaries at Katikati. ZHM Manufacturing at Tauriko processes that material into tubes and sachets in their new facility.
HoneyLab is also developing other bee-related products. Rubeeven™, which reduces joint pain and stiffness; and Kanu Bee Venom®, an anti-aging beauty cream.
Bee venom for these products is collected at the same time as the honey using a process known as “milking”. HoneyLab has patented equipment that involves electrified plates outside the hive. The bees attack and deposit venom on those plates but they don’t die.
“What really interests me as a doctor is that bee stings have been used for centuries for pain in joints and muscles. People used bees to sting themselves to reduce pain, but we have put bee venom into a cream that you can rub in instead,” says Shaun.
“Bee venom has also been widely used as a cosmetic for wrinkles, but we are the only company that has applied science to the process and carried out research and published trials, and we have proven that it works and proven the dose that you need. Harrods are interested in stocking it, which would be nice.”
Another product under development is a novel portable product containing honey, which many studies have shown is an ideal fuel for athletes because the combination of sugars gives both instant energy and energy released over a longer period.
“We are working on a unique product so when athletes are out running or cycling and suddenly run out of energy, they can have honey on the go which will give sufficient energy for around 3 km of running,” says Shaun.
On the strength of the rosacea trial results, Shaun is shortly going to an international fair in Frankfurt, the biggest pharmaceutical partnering conference in the world, to try to license the rosacea product and others to interested pharmaceutical companies.
“We are a small New Zealand company and it is sometimes hard to get taken seriously by the big players. However, our credibility has been helped recently by our partnership with the Mayo Clinic in the United States,” he says. “They peer review our research and we are jointly developing a novel natural health product.”
The following press release was issued on 29 March 2015.
New Zealand Honey Product Proven To Help Rosacea Sufferers
Large clinical trial shows that a kanuka honey formulation is as good as prescription medicines
29th March 2015 – There is new hope for the 5-10% of adults who suffer from rosacea in the form of a medical kanuka honey formulation from New Zealand. A large clinical trial undertaken by the Medical Research Institute of New Zealand proved that Honevo, a medical-grade kanuka honey formulation developed by HoneyLab, was an effective and safe treatment.
The results were recently presented at the American Academy of Dermatology meeting in San Francisco by HoneyLab Science Director Dr. Shaun Holt1. 65% of people had an improvement with Honevo, 34% had a large improvement and in 13% the disease disappeared completely. Improvements were seen within 2 weeks and had increased when the study ended at 8 weeks. The results were statistically and clinically significant and at least as good, if not better, than those that have been achieved for standard prescription-only treatments.
Dr. Holt said that people were often seeking natural treatments rather than prescription drugs, but there were very few natural products that had successfully undergone rigorous clinical trials. “This medical-grade kanuka honey formulation delivers the best of both worlds: a natural and safe product, but also one that is proven to be effective to the standards of a pharmaceutical medicine”.
Rosacea is a chronic red rash on the face, particularly the cheeks and nose. Long-term antibiotics are the standard treatment, but as well as potentially causing side effects, this can contribute to antibiotic resistance, which the World Health Organization has declared to be a threat to global health security.
Dr. Holt said that recent developments in the understanding of the cause of rosacea explained why the kanuka honey formulation was so effective. “It is now thought that the underlying causes of rosacea are mites and associated bacteria living deep in the skin in the affected area, and the rosacea symptoms are an inflammatory reaction to these. As medical kanuka honey is effective at killing micro-organisms and reducing inflammation there is an excellent explanation as to why it works so well”.
Honevo is applied as a mask twice a day and then easily washes off. This patent-pending kanuka honey formulation contains a small amount of another natural product which improves its physical characteristics, making it less sticky than regular honey. It is also far more temperature stable and does not get too runny when hot or too hard when cold.
HoneyLab are a New Zealand pharmaceutical company with several platforms of clinical research, including dermatology, pain, and nutrition. The company plans to license products to pharmaceutical companies once effectiveness and safety have been proven, and are already in discussions with several of the world’s biggest pharmaceutical companies. The current size of the rosacea market is estimated to be US$1.5 billion, but many people do not seek a treatment as a prescription from a doctor is usually required. As no prescription is required for the new kanuka honey treatment, the potential market is effectively around twice as large.
The research was partially funded by a grant from Callaghan Innovation. People with rosacea order the product at www.honeylab.co.nz
Contacts
Science
Dr. Shaun Holt
Phone 029 200 11 11
Business
Laurence Greig
laurence@honeylab.co.nz
Phone 021 939 201
Study details
Professor Richard Beasley
richard.beasley@mrinz.ac.nz
Phone 021 40 30 60
1S Holt, I Braithwaite, A Hunt, J Riley, M Holliday, R Beasley. A topical kanuka honey formulation is an effective treatment for rosacea. Annual Meeting of the American Academy of Dermatology 2015. Poster 871