John,
Just to back up your opinion on the Vertex release, I have extracted quotes from their release and the comparable Viracept numbers:
From yesterday's announcement:
Vertex (VRTX) said the results are from first-time preliminary
12-week data from a continuing interim-stage study of 141W94, which also has started late-stage, or phase III clinical trials.
The drug was used with Retrovir, also known as AZT, and Epivir,
commonly known as 3TC.
The company said in the triple combination study of 141W94, AZT and
3TC, about 70% of patients had undetectable viral load at 12 weeks.
Contrast this to Viracept at 48 weeks:
The clinical data were compiled during a 48-week period
beginning in the spring of 1996 at 50 centers in the United
States. Other data from the same clinical trials, which are
ongoing, were the basis for FDA approval earlier this year of
Viracept, which reached the market March 14.
Johnson, in New York for a Montgomery Securities
health-care conference, said the HIV virus was undetectable in
96 percent of patients with early infection, defined as less
than 50,000 viruses per cubic millimeter of blood.
And among those who responded to the cocktail, 95 percent
continued to have undetectable "viral loads" after 48 weeks, hesaid.
But among patients with longer infections evidenced by
100,000 or more viruses per cubic millimeter, only 81 percent
showed absence of detectible virus after treatment.
Among them, only 80 to 85 percent had undetectable virus after 48 weeks.
______
So even with the patients that started with a high viral load, Viracept did much better at 48 weeks than the Vertex drug for all patients at 12 weeks.
I've seen no analyst or newspaper reporting of this yet, other than a simple acceptance of Vertex's self-characterized "good results."
Peter |
