Bristol Myers Squibb’s HIV drug “an important step forward”

Bristol Myers-Squibb has hailed Atripla, its new treatment for HIV patients, as “an important step forward”.

Atripla, developed in combination with Gilead Sciences, is described as the first once-daily treatment regimen for the HIV-1 virus. It is a combination therapy of three drugs belonging to two different classes anti-HIV drugs, which all work by inhibiting reverse transcriptase, an enzyme important to the virus’ ability to replicate.

In clinical trials, a once-daily regime of the Atripla drugs was compared with twice ?daily Combivir and once-daily Sustiva in patients who had not received treatment before. Virus RNA levels were reduced to under 400 copies per millilitre in 84 per cent of patients in the Atripla group, compared to 73 per cent of patients in the Combivir and Sustiva group.

Having yesterday been approved by the FDA for use, Atripla was praised by Anthony C Hooper, president of Bristol Myers-Squibb’s US pharmaceuticals division. He said: “With the approval of Atripla, Bristol-Myers Squibb continues two decades of progress in the development and commercialisation of medications to treat HIV.”

He added: “Atripla is an important step forward as we continue our focus on discovering, developing and providing innovative treatments for serious diseases.”

Dr John G Bartlett of the John Hopkins University concluded: “The availability of Atripla marks the culmination of ten years of efforts to simplify dosing while helping to achieve and maintain effective viral suppression for adults infected with HIV-1.”

Antiretroviral drugs are often prescribed in combination because the HIV virus can become resistant to some drugs if it mutates, so it is necessary to suppress as much virus reproduction as possible to lessen the chance of this happening.

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