Biotech Holdings files for issuance of warrants at $.10

Press Release Source: Biotech Holdings Ltd. Thursday April 3, 9:00 am ET

VANCOUVER, April 3 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ - Robert Rieveley, President of Biotech Holdings (the "Company", BIOHF.OB: OB; BIO.V) announced today that the Company has filed with the TSX Venture Exchange for issuance of 10 million warrants, at $.10 per share. The warrants are to be issued to creditors of the Company in consideration of their extending the time for repayment of $3,108,077 of loans that they have advanced to Biotech Holdings.

ADVERTISEMENT "Our funding sources have indicated their willingness to accept Convertible Share Purchase Warrants in exchange for extending the time period for repayment of their demand loans for twelve months. We believe that this is a favorable arrangement for Biotech and have accepted this offer to ensure our ongoing operations," Mr. Rieveley said.

Biotech Holdings has developed a prescription drug trademarked as "Sucanon" for the treatment of Type II Diabetes. Sucanon is an insulin- receptor sensitizer, a new class of drugs for controlling the chronically high blood sugar levels that typify diabetes. The drug, in tablet form, works by improving patients' ability to utilize insulin, the hormone that controls blood sugar levels. Type II Diabetes affects more than 17 million people in North America, over 20 million in Latin America and over 150 million worldwide.

Sucanon is currently in regulatory review in Mexico, where it was submitted in September 2001. Sucanon, also known as DIAB II, has been approved as a prescription treatment of Type II Diabetes in Peru and China and is on sale in China on a test-market basis. Biotech Holdings has also signed distribution agreements for the drug for Chile, Venezuela and Argentina and is looking forward to making regulatory application for Sucanon in these jurisdictions as well as in Brazil, where the Company has conducted a clinical trial of Sucanon.

Biotech Holdings Ltd.'s head office and laboratory facility is in Richmond, British Columbia. Biotech Holdings' shares trade on the Over the Counter Bulletin Board in the United States (BIOHF.OB) and on the TSX Venture Exchange in Canada (BIO.V). For inquiries, contact Austin Rand at Biotech Holdings Ltd., 1-888-216-1111 (toll-free), 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Pacific time, orby e-mail at biotech@direct.ca; For background information and current stock quotations, please visit Biotech's website at www.biotechltd.com.

The TSX Venture Exchange has not reviewed and does not accept responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.