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Biotech / Medical : Biotech Valuation -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: MJ who wrote (8783)	6/28/2003 1:12:45 PM
From: Biomaven	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 52153

Issues like egg allergies only have an effect at the margin. These are the bigger issues that I think will drive Flumist acceptance (or not): 1. Obviously the lack of an injection - estimates I've seen are that 1/3 of the population feel strongly enough about injections so that they avoid injections that are not required. Also, the lack of an injection makes a pharmacy-based approach easier. 2. There are strong hints that Flumist is more effective than the existing vaccine. In the pivotal trials year, the prevailing strain turned out to be quite a bit different than what had been predicted, but the vaccine was still effective. (There are apparently theoretical reasons why it should be more effective). 3. I believe (but am not 100% sure) that Flumist is quicker to prepare, meaning it will be available a month or two earlier than the regular vaccine. Right now, the process is that a committee of the WHO meets in February to decide the strains to include for the Northern Hemisphere, and then there is a six to eight month process before the first lots of a vaccine is available. Because of uncertain supplies, healthy people are not encouraged to seek vaccination until all the at-risk population have been vaccinated. Flumist is going after quite a different market - the healthy population excluding the youngest and oldest (partly of course because that's all they have a label for). 4. Right now there is no commercial advertising for flu vaccines - just public service type announcements. With a massive ad budget (Wyeth is spending $50m this year) that is about to change in a big way. This article discusses the present timeline and how it may be speeded up in the case of a pandemic: who.int 4. Obviously label expansion trials will have a big impact. I'm pretty sure that they will get the label expansion to older and younger groups in a few (3-4?) years. 5. On the down side, we may yet of course see rare allergies and reactions that didn't show up in the trials. Bottom line is that I think Flumist will qualitatively change the market - it is not just an incremental change. Many analysts have a tough time with qualitative changes - anything more than a simple extrapolation is too daring for them. (Another qualitative change I predict will be the sleep market with Estorra and Indiplon once the prevailing wisdom that sleep drugs are only safe for short-term use is changed). I see these qualitative changes as critical for biotech investing (indeed all long-term investing). It takes a long time for the market to catch on to them, so if you can hitch a ride early you can do very well. Peter