Alzheimer’s is the biggest market for new schizophrenia drugs, says Bristol-Myers Squibb

In an interview, company executives said each of the therapeutic uses they are studying has multibillion-dollar potential for Cobenfy, including Alzheimer’s disease psychosis, Alzheimer’s agitation and Alzheimer’s cognition, bipolar disease, and autism. But Alzheimer’s “is a really big market,” Bristol-Myers Squibb CFO David Elkins told CNBC on Tuesday at the JPMorgan Healthcare Conference in San Francisco.

There are approx. 6 million Alzheimer’s patients in the USAnd about half of them have psychotic symptoms, or hallucinations and delusions, Elkins said. Chief Commercialization said Cobenfy could be the first drug approved specifically for Alzheimer’s-related psychosis. Officer Adam Lenkowski.

Atypical antipsychotics – drugs used to treat a range of psychiatric disorders – are often used to treat psychosis in Alzheimer’s patients even though they are not approved for this purpose. But those treatments can increase the risk of death, and Cobanfai doesn’t, according to Bristol-Myers Squibb.

Meanwhile, Alzheimer’s agitation, a symptom that can make a patient restless and anxious, is estimated to affect about 60 percent to 70 percent of patients with the disease. Some studies.

Bristol-Myers Squibb said on Monday it plans to release early late-stage trial data for Cobain Fi in the treatment of Alzheimer’s-related psychosis later this year, earlier than expected. The company also expects to begin phase three trials in Alzheimer’s agitation, Alzheimer’s cognition and bipolar disorder in 2025, while studies on autism will begin in 2026.

According to a research note on Tuesday, JPMorgan analyst Chris Schott expects Cobenfy’s sales to reach about $5 billion by 2030, with the treatment Sales are expected to be in the $10 billion range across multiple uses. This is a huge boon for Bristol-Myers Squibb as it faces pressure to offset potential losses from its best-selling treatment. face which will see their patents expire.

It’s a full-circle moment for Cobenfy, which became the first new type of treatment for the nearly 3 million American adults with schizophrenia in decades after receiving approval in September. This drug comes from Bristol-Myers Squibbs. $14 billion acquisition of biotech company Corona Therapeutics By the end of 2023.

But the drug has its roots in treating Alzheimer’s.

Eli Lilly originally tested one part of the drug – xanomeline – in the 1990s to reduce cognitive decline before keeping it because of severe side effects such as nausea, vomiting, diarrhea and constipation. Xanomeline activates certain so-called muscarinic receptors in the brain to reduce dopamine activity without causing the side effects associated with antipsychotics.

Andrew Miller, founder and former president of research and development at Corona Therapeutics and now a consultant at Bristol-Myers Squibb, saw xanomeline’s potential in neuroscience and combined xanomeline with another existing drug, trospium, to reduce these side effects. Created the theory together. He launched Corona to develop the compound as a treatment for schizophrenia.

Other Advance treatment Recently entered the market for Alzheimer’s, incl Biogen And Suchs Leqembi and Eli Lillyof Kisunla. These treatments work in part by clearing toxic plaques called amyloid in the brain to reduce memory and thinking loss in patients in the early stages of Alzheimer’s.

But as people progress through their disease, they experience symptoms such as psychosis and agitation, said Elkins of Bristol-Myers Squibb.

“That’s where Cobenfy fits it,” he said. “If you can get rid of the psychosis, the provocation, people’s cognition is better. Imagine for the caregivers and the health care system as a whole, what this medicine can do for these patients and their loved ones. How effective it can be in this context.”