A BRITISH drugs company has found a cure for hayfever derived from the saliva of blood-sucking parasites.

Ticks usually are equated with the spread of Lyme disease, the potentially fatal infection carried by the insect, which it transmits when it bites its victims.

Now, however, Evolutec, a British company, has proved that a treatment derived from ticks’ spit can alleviate the symptoms of hayfever faster than other medicines already on the market.

Shares in Evolutec jumped 19½p to close at 173p yesterday, a record high, after the company said that key trials of the drug had proved that the hayfever treatment not only worked but acted more quickly than rival products.

Mark Carnegie-Brown, the chief executive, said that Evolutec would look for a partner to help to take the drug through a final stage of tests next year.

The science behind Evolutec’s discovery is based on the array of molecules that ticks inject into the skin in order to trick the immune system into ignoring them. In this way, they can feed on human beings for up to two weeks without being detected. Scientists initially had thought that ticks relied on a cocktail of molecules to avoid discovery by their hosts. Evolutec, however, has isolated one particular molecule from the parasite that can suppress the immune system of hayfever sufferers.

In tests, the company found that its drug, which has been developed into a nasal spray, significantly eased congestion and stifled mucus production. Evolutec also found that the treatment, which has not yet been named, worked within 45 minutes. Most of the steroid-based medicines on the market take up to eight hours to work. The trials were conducted in the United States under the guidance of regulators, which should speed up the approval process.

Michael Aitkenhead, an analyst at Baird Securities, said that the fast-acting nature of the drug would put it ahead of rival treatments in a market that is worth about $6 billion (£3.3 billion) a year in the United States alone.

Mr Carnegie-Brown moved to reassure shareholders that he would hold out for the best arrangement: “We won’t be coming back to the market in a couple of months with a done deal. Our focus has always been to concentrate on building the company. We won’t be selling the crown jewels early.”

Evolutec, based in Oxford, is working on treatments for post-cataract surgery and dry eye also drawn from tick spit.

• Regulators have ordered Sanofi Pasteur MSD to suspend sales of a vaccine that is supposed to protect children from a range of diseases, because of fears that the injection is not effective against hepatitis B. The European Medicines Agency told the company yesterday to pull Hexavac from pharmacy shelves after uncovering problems in the production of the vaccine.

  Spit Capital

  Several firms aim to harness the therapeutic powers of animal saliva:

• Schering markets Refludan, a blood-thinning treatment based on leech spit.

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