Boehringer prepares for diabetes launch
pharmafile | December 3, 2009 | News story | Medical Communications |Â Â Boehringer, DPP-4, diabetesÂ
Boehringer Ingelheim has hired the London arm of international PR agency Weber Shandwick to handle the UK launch of its new type II diabetes drug.
The agency’s healthcare MD Lucie Harper confirmed it would be working on the launch of linagliptin, but declined to give details.
In September, Boehringer Ingelheim suggested the oral once-daily tablet had performed well in phase III trials, although full data will be released next year.
In phase II studies earlier this year it was given as add-on therapy to patients inadequately controlled with metformin.
It reduced haemoglobin and fasting plasma glucose with a good safety profile and no recorded cases of hypoglycaemia.
Linagliptin is a member of the DPP-4 inhibitor class, which includes two already approved drugs – MSD’s Januvia (sitagliptin) and Novartis’ Galvus (vildagliptin).
It could also threaten older oral diabetes treatments such as GlaxoSmithKline’s Avandia (rosiglitazone).
Linagliptin will also rival the newest kid on the DPP-4 block, Onglyza (saxagliptin), which is co-marketed by Bristol-Myers Squibb and AstraZeneca.
Onglyza has already had a positive opinion from the Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use and is due for an imminent UK launch with PR support from healthcare agency Virgo Health.
DPP-4 inhibitors affect incretins, the hormones that lower blood sugar levels by increasing the body’s utilisation of sugar.
The class is effective at lowering blood sugar levels but does not carry with it side-effects such as weight gain.
Earlier this year, AstraZeneca-funded research showed UK diabetes rates are growing at a faster rate than in the US.
There are two million sufferers in this country, with more than 100,000 diagnosed each year.
Linked to obesity, type II diabetes comes with long-term complications affecting many parts of the body.
Around 250 million people worldwide have diabetes – the vast majority of them type II – which kills 3.8 million people each year.
The International Diabetes Federation estimates the number of sufferers will rise to 380 million by 2025.
Around half of these will die of cardiovascular disease and a tenth from renal failure.
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