The "Economics" of Hepatitis C

[Hep Editors]

-Current estimates show that up to 3.9 million people are living with hepatitis C in the U.S. today.
-Today, the efficacy of hepatitis C treatment is upwards of 90% for most people.
-Right now, the discounted lifetime cost of treating 1 person with hepatitis C in the U.S. is $58,000.

At this point in time, we have an incredible opportunity to nearly eliminated hepatitis C in the United States by taking appropriate and timely steps. If we do this, hepatitis C could be a nonissue in this country by 2035.

Here’s how: http://www.hepmag.com/articles/2502_28097.shtml

[KimInTheForest]

This article makes excellent points. One thing I am confused about...

The article says: HCV is "an epidemic impacting up to 3.9 million people in the U.S."

Later it says: "more than a million patients [will need] HCV treatment in the next 3 to 5 years in the U.S."

Why wouldn't all 3.9 million need treatment in the next 3-5 years? It seems to me that this article is still operating with a triage mentality of treating the most urgent first instead of treating everyone now, which the article otherwise seems to be advocating.

kim

[Westy]

I am dumbfounded why so long and why so expensive ?

The patent expires in 2025 so the meds should only cost a few hundred bucks a course by then. US taxpayers paid for a lot of the development costs for Sofisbuvir just so they can be fleeced to the tune of 100's of billions by the drug companies.

The Economics of Hepatitis C are like this.

With Pharmasset we can look at the balance sheet immediately prior to Gilead's purchase. At the time the sunk capital cost (accumulated deficit) was $324 million. That's a lot of money, but nothing like the $7 billion valuation in the market (20x) or the sale price of $11 billion (33x).

That $324 million represents almost the ENTIRE development cost of this medication. There would have been another $50 million for the Phase 3 trials. Call it $400 million all in.

With some 613,000 people treated to date at around $50,000 per person the return is already north of $30 billion. That is 60 x the sunk cost in 3 years.

To treat the entire US population would be north of $200 billion. That is 500 x the sunk cost.

Sofisbuvir costs just 5 cents per dose to manufacture in India.

cheers