Posted by
Dawnrays Pharma on Wednesday, December 24, 2008 1:00:00 PM
Scientists
are concerned that industry interest in developing anti-infective
drugs is waning and measures may be required to counter this trend.
They
packed a Sept. 15 session here on "Why is big pharma getting out of anti-infective
drug discovery?" at the 43rd Annual Interscience Conference on
Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy.
The
number of submissions to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in this area was
down about 10% this year and "the quality of the compounds is somewhat
less," said Steven Projan, PhD, a vice president with Wyeth Research.
"The
investment equation is shifting away from treating acute disease towards
chronic disease, towards larger markets," he said. As a result, many of
the major pharmaceutical companies "have stopped or have greatly curtailed
their anti-infective drug discovery work, especially for anti-bacterials."
Other
factors influencing the lack of anti-infective research are limited success in
identifying novel agents and the difficulty and expense of conducting clinical
trials, particularly if one is seeking an indication for treating
drug-resistant infections.
Anti-infectives
are the third largest segment of the pharmaceutical industry, with annual sales
totaling $45 billion.
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