New anti-obesity drug - Sanofi - looks good....

Sanofi Diet Drug Impressive in 2-Year Study
Tue Nov 9, 2004 04:42 PM ET


By Bill Berkrot
NEW ORLEANS (Reuters) - An experimental diet drug helped people lose nearly four times as much weight as a placebo in an eagerly anticipated two-year trial, researchers said on Tuesday.

Acomplia, made by Sanofi-Aventis, helped patients shed pounds and abdominal fat after one year and keep it off for two in the study presented at the American Heart Association annual scientific meeting. Abdominal fat is considered an important indicator of heart risk.

"They achieved and maintained an average weight loss of 19 pounds compared to 5.1 pounds in the placebo group," Dr. Xavier Pi-Sunyer, head of the obesity research center at New York's St Lukes-Roosevelt Hospital and the trial's lead investigator, told a news conference.

Patients taking the Sanofi drug over two years also significantly improved their levels of HDL, the so-called good cholesterol, lowered triglycerides and had better insulin sensitivity, researchers said.

"I think you're getting a double whammy. One is related to the weight loss and the other to the lipid improvement," Pi-Sunyer said.

The results of the 3,040-patient North American study added to the growing body of positive evidence on the drug, also known as rimonabant, following previously presented one-year data from Europe, and greatly enhanced the French drugmaker's chances of winning regulatory approval.

Excitement has been building for this drug since the previous trials had similar results and also helped patients quit smoking. Smoking and obesity are two of the greatest risk factors for developing heart disease.

There was no smoking component to the two-year study, but the drug's ability to suppress unhealthy cravings has been clearly demonstrated.

Its novel mode of action targets the same biological "switch" in the brain that makes people hungry when they smoke marijuana. The drug binds to and blocks a so-called cannabinoid receptor protein found on the surface of brain cells.

It is widely believed that this highly anticipated drug was the catalyst in the merger of Sanofi-Synthelabo and Aventis, forming the world's third largest pharmaceutical company.

Analysts expect Acomplia to be a multibillion-dollar growth driver for the French company, with at least one predicting peak sales of $6 billion a year....

Full story from Reuters: http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6763389&src=rss/topNews&section=news