The 4 million Americans affected by Hepatitis C may have some good news coming to them today: Vertex Pharmaceuticals' experimental drug, telaprevir, has performed even better than expected in clinical trials.
Three quarters of patients in the trial who got 12 weeks of the drug were found to have no trace of the virus in their blood for 24 weeks following treatment. This is considered a sustained virulogic response and the closest thing to a cure that currently exists.
"The community hopes that if telaprevir is approved by the F.D.A. that it will be accessible and affordable to everyone," Lorren Sandt, chairwoman of the National Viral Hepatitis Roundtable, told the New York Times. As of now, the drug is expected to cost tens of thousands of dollars for a course of treatment.
thank you for your information. is it available in South East Asia now?
I worked in CCU and ICU in the 70′s and early 80′s.
My DR. discovered Hep C 2 years ago- after 7 months of treatment the virus mutat and now load is over 25 million.
when will this drug be approved?
It would be so beneficial to so many individuals if telaprevir is approved by the F.D.A. and that it becomes accessible and affordable to everyone. Wish it happens soon.
I am a Vietnam veteran who has Hep C and wants to have some of the new cure promise drug hopefully available soon and ok’s by the FDA Thank You very much
I am a Veteran and I can’t wait for the new drug, failure of a past treatment has caused me incresed virul counts.
Thanks.
The cost of these “new cures” is supposed to be tens of tthousands of dollars. And, here’s the catch, the patient still has to take Interferon and Ribavirin, which is also expensive. Interferon and Ribavirin are a cure for HCV (the best experts tell me) so why do we need a new drug that works with the current cure? The cure is difficult, some might say it’s worse than the disease (I would be one of them) and they warn you upfront that the biggest side effect is suicide. What we need is a drug that doesn’t rely on the existing cure. And we need to know which genotype of HCV the drugs are treating. As far as I know, the closest drugs are for Type 1 (not sure if it’s 1a or 1b or both)
I have known for a while that I have Hep C. My doctor wants to start me on the treatment, but I do not have a job nor any insurance. He is currently trying to find some kind of program to assist me but has not had any luck yet. I would gladly deal with the side affects for a chance to survive this disease.
Is this drug approved yet? I would love to be able to watch my 1 1/2 yr old son grow into a fine young man. He is my world.
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Simple but very accurate info… Many thanks for sharing this one.
A must read article!
I think that everything typed made a ton of sense.
But, consider this, what if you added a little content?
I am not suggesting your content is not good., but suppose you added
something to possibly grab folk’s attention? I mean New Hepatitis C Drug Looks Promising is kinda plain. You should look at Yahoo’s home page and watch how they create article titles to grab
people to click. You might add a related video or a related pic or two to get people excited about what you’ve got to say. In my opinion, it could bring your posts a little livelier.