Vertex shares jump on hepatitis C data

NEW YORK, Nov 2 (Reuters) - Vertex Pharmaceuticals Inc shares jumped 14 percent on Monday after the company presented data on its closely watched experimental hepatitis C treatment that showed it was as effective when given twice a day as when given three times daily. Not only was the drug, telaprevir, virtually equally effective in twice-daily dosing, but the cure rates exceeded 80 percent and there were no additional safety issues despite the larger dose used. The latest telaprevir data, from a small Phase II study, was released over the weekend at a meeting in Boston of the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases. All previous telaprevir studies involved only three-times-a-day dosing. "We believe this finding represents a meaningful improvement to convenience and supports the drug's commercial potential," Needham & Co analyst Alan Carr said in a research note. "Furthermore, the relatively high SVR (sustained viral response) rates in this trial of greater than 80 percent suggest that better side effect management as well as response-guided therapy are having a positive impact on treatment outcome," Carr said. Response-guided therapy refers to an approach in which duration of treatment is based on how a patient responds to the medicines during the first few weeks of therapy. "The absolute SVR rates observed in the trial provide evidence that Phase III data for telaprevir could potentially improve over Phase II due to design changes and better management of side effects," Leerink Swann analyst Howard Liang said in a note. "We believe these data could help relieve competitive concerns and improve the outlook for the stock going into 2010," Liang added. Telaprevir, which is given in combination with the current standard treatments of pegylated-interferon and ribavirin, has consistently shown in trials far higher SVR rates than the standard drugs alone. A rival similar experimental drug being developed by Schering-Plough Corp, boceprevir, also appears to represent a promising advance in treatment of the serious liver disease. Vertex is expected to seek U.S. approval of telaprevir in the second half of 2010 and begin selling it in 2011. Vertex shares were up $4.81, or 14.3 percent, at $38.37 in late-morning trading on Nasdaq. (Reporting by Bill Berkrot; editing by John Wallace) Keywords: VERTEX/ ([e-mail]; [phone]; Reuters Messaging: [e-mail]) COPYRIGHT Copyright Thomson Reuters 2009. All rights reserved.

The copying, republication or redistribution of Reuters News Content, including by framing or similar means, is expressly prohibited without the prior written consent of Thomson Reuters.