Boston—Can treatment of hepatitis C infection with new direct-acting antivirals (DAAs) be shortened to less than 12 weeks? Interim results from a recent trial suggest treatment durations of eight or even four weeks may be possible with the right combination of drugs.
Shortened regimens would help contain health care costs, with 12-week courses of new DAAs hovering close to $100,000. Prolonged treatment may also compromise patient adherence to therapy, experts said.
“Optimized regimens may allow an eight-week duration that may be broadly applicable across diverse patient groups,” said Eric Lawitz, MD, vice president of scientific and research development at The Texas Liver Institute, in San Antonio, who led the study. Dr. Lawitz, also clinical professor of medicine at the San Antonio University of Texas Health Science Center, said large randomized trials are needed before changes to clinical practice can be made.
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Wednesday, February 11, 2015
New drugs, price war provide hope for hepatitis C patients
Sallie Wickens’ life followed a death-defying narrative that traced the medical arc of hepatitis C:
A blood-transfusion infection after a car accident in 1959, when she was 5; a positive test for the virus when she was 30; 10 years of deteriorating health; a debilitating course of interferon drug treatments that didn’t work; a liver so damaged she needed a transplant.
And then, her doctor, hepatologist Laura Alba, walked into an exam room last month at St. Luke’s Hospital and gave Wickens, 60, a big smile.
Tuesday, February 10, 2015
Pa. considering moving away from costly Hepatitis C treatment
(Harrisburg) -- Pennsylvania might move away from a stunningly expensive prescription drug treatment for Medicaid patients with Hepatitis C, but the Commonwealth won't save as much as other states.
Missouri is one of the first states to move away from Sovaldi, which costs $1,000 a pill.
Pennsylvania might do the same, but the state's Medicaid program is waiting on final offers from two competitors that provide other drugs recently approved by the FDA for Hepatitis C treatment.
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Missouri is one of the first states to move away from Sovaldi, which costs $1,000 a pill.
Pennsylvania might do the same, but the state's Medicaid program is waiting on final offers from two competitors that provide other drugs recently approved by the FDA for Hepatitis C treatment.
Read more...
LePage wrongly blames ‘illegals’ for diseases in Maine
Blaming immigrants for local woes — they’re taking your jobs, they’re a drain on public assistance programs and making your taxes go up — has long been a staple of Republican campaigns. The new strategy is to blame illegal immigrants for disease outbreaks in America, when there is no evidence to support this.
In spontaneous remarks during his State of the State address last week, Gov. Paul LePage tied these immigrants to a costly uptick in hepatitis C, HIV and tuberculosis.
“But this is the problem with some of the illegals that are here today,” the governor said. “When a refugee comes here from a foreign country, they get a medical assessment and we know their health. But when they are here illegally, they don’t get medical assessments.
Canada: Gastrointestinal Society Releases New Video about Hepatitis C
Canada NewsWire
VANCOUVER Feb. 10 2015
Baby boomers need to be tested
VANCOUVER Feb. 10 2015 /CNW/ - As many as 350000 Canadians could be suffering with hepatitis C many of whom are unaware that they are infected thus continuing to spread the virus. Although there is a vaccine to prevent the spread of the hepatitis A and hepatitis B viruses there is no vaccine for hepatitis C. The good news is that with new treatments hepatitis C is now a curable disease.
Many Canadians with hepatitis C do not have any symptoms but for those who do symptoms are generally nonspecific such as mild fatigue or discomfort in the abdomen. However delaying treatment can actually make things worse; the infected individual may feel mostly fine but the virus is causing inflammation which slowly wreaks havoc on the liver eventually leading to cirrhosis severe symptoms and even liver cancer.
"It's very important that individuals with risk factors get tested for the hepatitis C virus" says Dr. James Gray Chair of the Gastrointestinal Society and Canadian Society of Intestinal Research Medical Advisory Council and Gastrointestinal Society co-founder "ideally we can put an end to the spread of hepatitis C by diagnosing treating and curing those who have the disease."
The GI Society has just released a video about hepatitis C to spread awareness and educate Canadians on the risk factors for this disease. The fast-paced whiteboard-style animation also includes information on diagnosis testing treatment management symptoms and more so you can do your part to help stop the spread of this disease. Watch the video online in English at www.badgut.org and in French at www.mauxdeventre.org. Dr. Gray narrates this animation in English and Jean Bruyère narrates in French.
Gail Attara Chief Executive Officer and co-founder of the Gastrointestinal Society who produced the video said "We are grateful for the medical support of Dr. James R. Gray Gastroenterologist and Clinical Professor University of British Columbia and Dr. Ed Tam Hepatologist of the Liver and Intestinal Research (LAIR) Centre. We are also very appreciative of the generous educational grants provided to us by AbbVie Corporation and Janssen Inc. that allowed us to produce this independent video."
Visit www.badgut.org watch and share this video (http://ow.ly/ICVF4); it could help save someone's life.
About the Gastrointestinal Society (GI Society)As the Canadian leaders in providing trusted evidence-based information on all areas of the gastrointestinal tract the Gastrointestinal (GI) Society and the Canadian Society of Intestinal Research are committed to improving the lives of people with GI and liver conditions by supporting research advocating for appropriate patient access to health care and promoting gastrointestinal and liver health.
SOURCEGI Society
PR Newswire
http://www.prnewswire.com/
Gilead faces challenge to European patent on pricey hep C drug
Feb 10 (Reuters) - Global health charity Medecins du Monde (MdM) launched a legal challenge on Tuesday to a European patent held by U.S. drugmaker Gilead Sciences Inc which it accused of charging "exorbitant" prices for a hepatitis C drug.
Arguing that Gilead is "abusing" its patent on Sovaldi, known generically as sofosbuvir, MdM said its challenge marked the first time in Europe a medical charity has used this method to try and improve patients' access to medicines.
"While using sofosbuvir to treat hepatitis C represents a major therapeutic advance, the molecule itself, which is the result of work by many public and private researchers, is not sufficiently innovative to warrant a patent," MdM said in a statement.
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UPDATED: Buoyed by 6-week hep C data, Achillion sets out to test even faster cure
While Regulus was getting dinged this morning following some careful scrutiny of its latest hep C data, Achillion came out on top with new trial results which demonstrated that a combination of its NS5A inhibitor and Gilead's Sovaldi triggered a 6-week cure among all of the patients in a small study. And now researchers are using the data to set the stage to see if the results can be replicated even faster in a 4-week trial.
Investigators found that 50 mg of ACH-3102 and 400 mg of sofosbuvir did the trick for 12 out of 12 treatment-naive genotype 1 patients. CEO Milind Deshpande touted the results as the shortest duration, highest response results yet seen. He added: "Given the exceptional profile of ACH-3102, we will now be evaluating four- and six-week treatment durations that leverage all of our HCV assets including ACH-3102, ACH-3422, and sovaprevir."
Achillion is still looking to enter a fast-crowding marketplace. Competing drugs from Gilead and AbbVie have forced out earlier standard remedies with oral combos that are much easier to tolerate and much more likely to provide a lasting cure. The goal now is to find ways to do it quicker and with less expense, providing an opening for some of the companies still in the hunt.
Read more...
Investigators found that 50 mg of ACH-3102 and 400 mg of sofosbuvir did the trick for 12 out of 12 treatment-naive genotype 1 patients. CEO Milind Deshpande touted the results as the shortest duration, highest response results yet seen. He added: "Given the exceptional profile of ACH-3102, we will now be evaluating four- and six-week treatment durations that leverage all of our HCV assets including ACH-3102, ACH-3422, and sovaprevir."
Achillion is still looking to enter a fast-crowding marketplace. Competing drugs from Gilead and AbbVie have forced out earlier standard remedies with oral combos that are much easier to tolerate and much more likely to provide a lasting cure. The goal now is to find ways to do it quicker and with less expense, providing an opening for some of the companies still in the hunt.
Read more...
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