Xconomy: Vertex Drug for Hepatitis C Shows Durable Virus-Killing Ability in Tough-to-Treat Patients
Summary
The Cambridge, MA-based company said today that telaprevir’s effect on killing the virus is remaining durable on follow-up analysis, and the drug appears to just about as good in a more convenient twice-daily pill form instead of its standard three-times-a-day dosing schedule.The data dump came in front of a prime audience of physicians attending the American Association for the Study of Liver Disease annual meeting today in San Francisco.The Vertex drug is highly anticipated, though, because it has shown in earlier trials that it can almost double the cure rate for patients when added to standard therapy, and in half the time.The true test of what’s considered a “clinical cure” is when patients have no sign of virus a full 24 weeks after they finish treatment, and that data isn’t yet available for release at this meeting, Vertex says.Based on my conversation with Vertex’s chief commercial officer, Kurt Graves, heading into the meeting, it doesn’t seem like this data will surprise physicians who have been following the telaprevir story.