Stock of US biotech company Biogen (BIIB), saw its biggest jump in 7 years after one of its Alzheimer drugs in development showed promise in clinical trials.
Bloomberg reports that Alzheimer patients with the highest dose of drug BAN2401 showed slower progression of the disease after 18 months, offering hope to nearly 50m people with dementia worldwide (and over 5.7m Americans with Alzheimer’s).
No one saw this coming
The rare success comes after investors had all but written off the drug when it failed a test back in December, amid a beleaguered search for an Alzheimer’s treatment.
More than 100 experimental Alzheimer’s drugs have already failed where BAN2401 hopes to succeed, and overall dementia drugs have had a 99.6% failure rate (for context, cancer drugs have an 80% failure rate in clinical trials).
But, this light is still a candle in the wind
We’re still only halfway through clinical trials, and analysts aren’t yet counting BAN2401 in their revenue projections for the drugmaker.
Continued setbacks have already caused drug companies like Pfizer to give up their search.
So, while investors may be rushing toward any glint of success in the $30B potential US market, Biogen’s still got a ways to go to prove that this is more than just a flash in the pan.
