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This Friday, Gilead, a Foster City,
California
based company, announced its results from two late-stage trials on the efficacy
of its Viread on patients with hepatitis B virus (HBV).
The positive results of the 48 week trials were presented at
the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases annual meeting in
Boston (Nov. 2-6).
Viread, or tenofovir disoproxil fumarate, is currently the Gilead product prescribed as antiretroviral agent for the
treatment of HIV. On the other hand, Gilead
has another product Hepsera, or adefovir dipivoxil, which is already approved
for treating the liver infection in adults.
In these trials Viread and Hepsera were administrated for 48
weeks in two patients’ groups. One group had HBeAg-negative chronic hepatitis B
and the other had HBeAg-positive hepatitis B. Both studies showed superior
results in case of treatment with Viread than in case of treatment with
especially HBV designed Hepsera. Both medicines were well tolerated by patients
in both two studies.
These results help Viread to have the basis to apply to
regulatory authorities in the United
States and European Union, in order to
market Viread as a treatment for HBV.
Chronic hepatitis B is among the top ten causes of
mortality, accounting worldwide an estimated number of 400 million people.
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