The Wall Street Journal reviews the slate of mid-stage therapies in clinical trials for obesity. While the market for new therapies is huge, the challenges involved in developing a therapy that's safe, effective and free of embarrassing side effects have been vexing for the R&D crowd.
Among the most promising therapies in the pipeline: Novo Nordisk's liraglutide [1], which triggered weight loss of more than 5 percent in 75 percent of Phase II volunteers; Amylin Pharmaceuticals' combo of pramlintide and metreleptin, which triggered an average weight loss of 12.7 percent in 177 Phase II volunteers; and Arena Pharmaceuticals' lorcaserin [2], which is going into Phase III.
- read the article [3] from the Wall Street Journal
Related Articles:
Biotechs discuss obesity therapies at BIO [4]
Obesity drugs pose weighty problems for researchers [5]
Fat cell research points to new approach on obesity [6]
Links:
[1] http://www.fiercebiotech.com/story/novo-no-pancreatitis-risk-linked-liraglutide/2007-10-17
[2] http://www.fiercebiotech.com/story/arena-touts-safety-profile-of-obesity-drug/2008-03-17
[3] http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121728227958891121.html?mod=2_1566_leftbox
[4] http://www.fiercebiotech.com/story/biotechs-discuss-obesity-therapies-bio/2008-06-20
[5] http://www.fiercebioresearcher.com/story/obesity-drugs-pose-weighty-problems-researchers/2008-06-10?utm_medium=rss&utm_source=rss&cmp-id=OTC-RSS-FBR0
[6] http://www.fiercebioresearcher.com/story/fat-cell-research-points-to-new-approach-on-obesity/2008-05-06