Abbott Labs rises on hepatitis C drug data (Update)

October 15, 2012 in Medications

Abbott Laboratories said Monday that its experimental hepatitis C drug regimen cured 99 percent of patients in a midstage study with the most common and hardest-to-treat type of the disease.

Patients who took a three-drug regimen and the drugs Ritonavir and ribavirin had undetectable virus levels after 12 weeks of treatment. The North Chicago, Illinois, company says it observed a 93 percent cure rate in a group of patients who were not helped by other treatments.

Patients in the trial had genotype 1 hepatitis C, which is the most common type in the Western world and the hardest to treat. The regimen did not include interferon, a standard component of hepatitis C therapy that causes flu-like side effects that can last for months. The study included 77 patients who hadn't been treated before and 41 patients who were not helped by other treatments.

Abbott shares rose $2.63, or 3.8 percent, to $71.90 in afternoon trading. The stock has been trading around all-time highs and peaked at $71.99 earlier in the session.

Shares of Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. also traded higher on promising data for a hepatitis C regimen. The company said 94 percent of patients who took a combination of three experimental drugs, daclatasvir, asunaprevir, and BMS-791325, were cured in a 12-week study. Those patients did not take interferon or ribavirin.

Shares of Bristol-Myers Squibb rose 88 cents, or 2.7 percent, to $33.97 in afternoon trading.

Hepatitis C is a virus that can lead to life-threatening liver damage and is the main cause of liver transplants in the U.S. Analysts say the market for treatments is potentially lucrative for drugmakers. More people are expected to be diagnosed with the tough-to-treat disease as the baby boomer generation ages.

After a two-decade drought, two new hepatitis C drugs were approved last year: Merck & Co.'s Victrelis and Incivek from Vertex Pharmaceuticals Inc. and Johnson & Johnson. Both significantly improve the cure rate over what has long been the standard of care, a mix of injections and pills with nasty side effects that takes several months and still doesn't cure many patients.

Citi Investment Research analyst Yaron Werber said the study results were strong, particularly in newly diagnosed patients. However he said the regimen is complicated because it includes five different types of pills, and Ritonavir can cause serious side effects when taken with some other medications. Werber said he believes a regimen being studied by Gilead Sciences Inc. could produce similar cure rates with fewer pills.

Gilead's approach uses two experimental pills, including its drug candidate sofosbuvir, as well as ribavirin.

Copyright 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

not rated yet  

Rank not rated yet
Relevant PhysicsForums posts

More news stories

Acne pill benefits outweigh blood clot risk: EU agency

Europe's medicines watchdog said Friday the benefits of acne drug Diane-35, also widely used as a contraceptive, outweigh the risk of developing blood clots in the veins—when correctly prescribed.

Medications created May 17, 2013 | popularity not rated yet | comments 0

First influenza vaccine brought to clinical testing

Singapore's Agency for Science, Technology and Research (A*STAR) and Switzerland's Cytos Biotechnology AG today announced that the first healthy volunteer has been dosed in a Phase 1 clinical trial with their ...

Medications created May 17, 2013 | popularity 5 / 5 (1) | comments 0

Aspirin not always best treatment for many individuals

(Medical Xpress)—An aspirin a day may not always keep heart disease away, say two University of Florida cardiologists. But a new algorithm they have developed outlines factors physicians should weigh as ...

Medications created May 16, 2013 | popularity 3.5 / 5 (2) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

FDA: lower ambien's dose to prevent drowsy driving

(HealthDay)—The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has approved new, lower-dose labeling for the popular sleep drug Ambien (zolpidem) in an effort to cut down on daytime drowsiness that could be a hazard ...

Medications created May 15, 2013 | popularity not rated yet | comments 0

Simponi approved for ulcerative colitis

(HealthDay)—Simponi (golimumab) injection has been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to treat adults with moderate-to-severe ulcerative colitis.

Medications created May 15, 2013 | popularity not rated yet | comments 0


Computational tool translates complex data into simplified 2-dimensional images

In their quest to learn more about the variability of cells between and within tissues, biomedical scientists have devised tools capable of simultaneously measuring dozens of characteristics of individual ...

New theory on genesis of osteoarthritis comes with successful therapy in mice

Scientists at Johns Hopkins have turned their view of osteoarthritis (OA) inside out. Literally. Instead of seeing the painful degenerative disease as a problem primarily of the cartilage that cushions joints, ...

'Gap' for HIV vaccine efforts after latest setback

The hunt for an HIV vaccine has gobbled up $8 billion in the past decade, and the failure of the most recent efficacy trial has delivered yet another setback to 26 years of efforts.

Alzheimer's leaves bilingual victims stranded in Canada

The devastating effect of Alzheimer's disease on bilingual people has been thrown into focus in Canada, where the sudden loss of a second language can leave sufferers feeling like strangers in their own country.

Consuming coffee linked to lower risk of detrimental liver disease, study finds

Regular consumption of coffee is associated with a reduced risk of primary sclerosing cholangitis (PSC), an autoimmune liver disease, Mayo Clinic research shows. The findings were being presented at the Digestive Disease ...

Ketamine shows significant therapeutic benefit in people with treatment-resistant depression

Patients with treatment-resistant major depression saw dramatic improvement in their illness after treatment with ketamine, an anesthetic, according to the largest ketamine clinical trial to-date led by researchers from the ...