Avastin to be tested against Lucentis in new government study
One of my more popular entries by search engine traffic has been my Avastin v Lucentis post. Well Lucentis is back in the news:
The U.S. government is considering an unusual study that pits two Genentech Inc. drugs against the same disease, jeopardizing almost $1 billion in estimated annual sales for the world's second-largest biotechnology company.
The government's National Institutes of Health may test whether South San Francisco-based Genentech's Avastin for colon cancer can treat a common eye ailment in the elderly as well as the company's Lucentis, a new drug that costs $1,950 a dose. The price is up to 100 times more than Avastin.
The study will determine whether Avastin is as effective as Lucentis is combating age-related wet macular degeneration, even though Avastin isn't specifically approved for the condition. Analysts apparently aren't worried about the success of Lucentis, though they should be. HMOs won't cover ridiculously expensive drugs when cheaper alternatives that are just as effective exist.
Treating dozens of patients a month at a cost approaching $2,000 a dose will rack up a large bill, he says, noting that insurers now pay $55 a dose for Avastin.
None of this would have ever come to a head if Genentech had done the smart thing and priced Lucentis much cheaper. Because Lucentis's only competition comes from another Genentech drug, Genentech felt they could set the bar as high as they wanted, because they were going to make money either way.
While I'm all for making money in business and medicine, setting the bar an order of magnitude higher than an existing drug which shows similar effects is 1) one way to get the government interested in what you're doing, and not in a positive way 2) build bad karma among your patient base and 3) label yourself (arguably so) as a worthless, moneygrubbing, big pharmaceutical company.
From my earlier post:
I think Genentech needs to re-think their pricing on this one. $1,900 is a lot of money, relatively speaking. On the other hand, $500 is not so much. I think Genentech would make up in volume what they’d lose in profit-per-dose if they lowered the price to something more reasonable, like that $500/shot.
Lowering the price to something more reasonable is a good way to get the government to keep its nose out of your business. Hello, Genentech? Anyone home?
[tags]Medicine, pharmacy, Genentech, Avastin, Lucentis, price gouging[/tags]
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As a patient with Macular Degeneration I am confused to say the least. I want the best for my eyes but it seems with these two drugs it's all about money. From what I have read Lucentis and Avastin are basically the same drug and Genetech saw a way to make huge profits by getting approval for Lucentis as a treatment for age related macular degeneration.
Comment by Mary Patterson — June 24, 2008 @ 7:36 pm
That is unfortunately correct, Mary.
Avastin works better than Lucentis, and it's much cheaper.
Comment by RJS — June 24, 2008 @ 10:30 pm