Roche sees positive late-stage data on Actemra

Roche has released new data for Actemra that demonstrates its effectiveness as a therapy for rheumatoid arthritis, helping clear the way to new drug applications in Europe and the U.S. In a recent study, four times the number of patients taking Actemra with standard therapy had a better than 50 percent improvement in their systems compared to a control group and more than 10 times the number of patients taking Actemra had a 70 percent improvement in symptoms compared to a control group. The results are in line with other therapies, but as Actemra targets a different protein it would be considered an alternative therapy for many patients. There's plenty of more data to come, though. This is the first of five international trials for the drug. The data was released at the annual European Congress of Rheumatology meeting in Barcelona.

- see the release
- read the MarketWatch report on the data

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