Free up the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favorite tales on this weekly publication.Pfizer is making plans to check a on daily basis weight-loss tablet in mid-stage trials later this 12 months, because the suffering pharmaceutical crew pins its hope at the experimental drug as its path right into a marketplace projected to be price greater than $130bn a 12 months.The New York-based drugmaker mentioned on Thursday that it could start research to judge the optimum dose of the weight-loss tablet in the second one part of this 12 months. The tablet is according to the compound danuglipron — a glucagon-like peptide, or GLP-1, very similar to the ones utilized in common weight-loss medication produced through Novo Nordisk and Eli Lilly. The announcement comes as Pfizer struggles to persuade buyers that it will possibly discover a trail to enlargement after the Covid-19 pandemic, as gross sales of its blockbuster vaccine and different Covid merchandise have plummeted. On the finish of remaining 12 months, the drugmaker discontinued assessments on a twice-daily model of danuglipron after the medication succeeded in losing weight in overweight sufferers however brought about nausea, vomiting and gastrointestinal negative effects. Mikael Dolsten, Pfizer’s outgoing leader medical officer, mentioned on Thursday that danuglipron “has demonstrated excellent efficacy in a twice-daily formula, and we consider a once-daily formula has the prospective to have a aggressive profile within the oral GLP-1 house”.Pfizer’s weight-loss tablet, although a success, will nonetheless be taking part in catch-up with rival medication. Novo Nordisk and Eli Lilly, which can be already producing billions in gross sales from their respective blockbuster weight-loss injections Wegovy and Zepbound, are trying out weight-loss capsules in phase-three trials.In the meantime, biotechs Zealand Pharma, Construction Therapeutics and Viking Therapeutics also are trying out weight-loss capsules in mid-stage trials, as different pharmaceutical corporations reminiscent of AstraZeneca and Amgen rush to search out an entrant into the profitable marketplace.Advisable
Goldman Sachs’ analysts previous this 12 months upgraded their forecast of the dimensions of the worldwide weight-loss drug marketplace at its annual height to $130bn from $100bn, estimating that 19mn US adults will likely be prescribed the medications for weight reduction.Pfizer’s first-quarter revenues fell 20 in keeping with cent 12 months on 12 months to $14.8bn, pushed through a pointy decline in gross sales of its Covid shot and Covid remedy tablet Paxlovid. At an investor convention hosted through Goldman Sachs remaining month, Albert Bourla, Pfizer’s leader govt, mentioned his urge for food for being within the weight-loss drug marketplace was once “very top”. However he mentioned GLP-1s had been “simply scratching the skin of what we can see in weight problems”.Weight-loss injections had been going through the “maximum coming near near festival”, he mentioned, and Pfizer had a possibility of launching an oral formula two years after Eli Lilly. Pfizer could also be inspecting a number of different weight-loss medication in pre-clinical research, together with formulations now not according to GLP-1s. The early-stage trial of danuglipron was once examined on 20 overweight sufferers, in line with the USA executive scientific trials database.Stocks in Pfizer, that have greater than halved from their pandemic-era height, had been up 1.3 in keeping with cent in a while after Wall Boulevard’s opening bell on Thursday.
