The Food and Drug Admistration approved CSL Behring's hemophilia B gene therapy, a one-off infusion that frees patients from regular treatments but costs $3.5 million a dose, making it the most expensive medicine in the world.
CSL Behring's Hemgenix, administered just once, cut the number of bleeding events expected over the course of a year by 54%, a key study of the therapy found. It also freed 94% of patients from time-consuming and costly infusions of Factor IX, which is currently used to control the potentially deadly condition.
"While the price is a little higher than expected, I do think it has a chance of being successful because 1) existing drugs are also very expensive and 2) hemophilia patients constantly live in fear of bleeds," said Brad Loncar, a biotechnology investor and chief executive officer of Loncar Investments. "A gene therapy product will be appealing to some."
Complete your profile to continue reading and get FREE access to BenefitsPRO, part of your ALM digital membership.
Your access to unlimited BenefitsPRO content isn’t changing.
Once you are an ALM digital member, you’ll receive:
- Breaking benefits news and analysis, on-site and via our newsletters and custom alerts
- Educational webcasts, white papers, and ebooks from industry thought leaders
- Critical converage of the property casualty insurance and financial advisory markets on our other ALM sites, PropertyCasualty360 and ThinkAdvisor
Already have an account? Sign In Now
© 2024 ALM Global, LLC, All Rights Reserved. Request academic re-use from www.copyright.com. All other uses, submit a request to [email protected]. For more information visit Asset & Logo Licensing.