Allergan gets EU licence for glaucoma drug

Allergan has announced it has received a licence to market Ganfort, its treatment for glaucoma, in Europe.

It is targeted at patients with open-angle glaucoma to reduce their interocular pressure (commonly known as eye pressure), which the company says is a key factor in controlling glaucoma and consequently preventing a cause of premature blindness.

Ganfort is combination of bitamoprost and timomol and studies show that Ganfort has a similar effectiveness as the separate use of these two drugs, while greater efficacy that either drug used on its own.

Scott Whitcup, Allergan’s vice president of research and development, said: “We are extremely pleased with the European Commission’s approval of Ganfort, which enables Allergan to provide physicians and patients throughout Europe with a once-daily, highly-effective and well-tolerated form of combination therapy for glaucoma.”

Interocular pressure is in most cases linked to blood pressure and if it is too high, the optic nerve can suffer damage. According to the Royal National Institute of the Blind, some form of glaucoma affects approximately two in every 100 Britons over the age of 40.

Glaucoma becomes much more common with increasing age and people of African descent are more at risk than people of other ethnicity. Also, glaucoma is more prevalent in short-sighted people, according to the institute.

Many glaucoma treatments are administered in the form of eye-drops – as is Ganfort – and they aim to lower the eye pressure or increase the blood supply to the optic nerve, which can become restricted with glaucoma.

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