Eli Lilly and Co (NYSE:LLY) revealed on Monday final results from its Phase 3 clinical study of donanemab at the Alzheimer’s Association International Conference in Amsterdam, which showed that the antibody treatment slowed progression of early-stage Alzheimer’s by about 35%.
The pharmaceutical giant is seeking US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approval for donanemab which, if granted, would be only the second Alzheimer’s treatment to receive consent from the FDA after the agency recently approved Leqembi from Japanese drugmaker Eisai.
Donanemab and Leqembi are lab-made antibodies, administered by intravenous (IV), which target sticky amyloid buildup in the brain.
Both drugs, though, can cause brain swelling or bleeding, which was linked to three deaths in the Eli Lilly study.
The donanemab trial enrolled 1,736 participants, at an average age of 73, who had mild to moderate symptoms of Alzheimer’s, with half receiving IV infusions of the treatment and half a placebo every four weeks for 18 months, which managed to show a delay in patient symptoms by about four to seven months.
While Biogen and Eisai have listed the price of Leqembi at US$26,500 a year, Lilly said it was not yet ready to set the price for its drug, the Financial Times reported.
The media outlet added that Datamonitor Healthcare forecasts combined sales for the two products of $9 billion a year by 2030 in the world’s main markets.
Shares of Eli Lilly were little changed at $449.54 in early-afternoon trading on Monday.
Contact Sean at sean@proactiveinvestors.com