A new, injected influenza drug appears to reduce symptoms as well as rival drugs Tamiflu and Relenza, researchers reported on Tuesday.
They said BioCryst Inc's peramivir cut by a third the number of days that people were sick with flu in a phase II trial, meant to show safety and efficacy.
The company should be able to move to phase III trials, the last phase before seeking U.S. Food and Drug Administration approval, Dr. Shigeru Kohno of the Nagasaki University Graduate School of Medicine, told a new conference.
A 2007 trial failed to show the new drug worked well but longer needles apparently delivered the drug more effectively, said Dr. Bill Sheridan, chief medical officer of BioCryst.
Two different doses of peramivir cut the time that people were sick with flu by 32 percent, Kohno, who studied the drug on behalf of Japan's Shionogi & Co, told a meeting of the American Society of Microbiology and the Infectious Diseases Society of America.
"We believe that peramivir will be a fine future option for influenza treatment as well as needed medication for highly pathogenic influenza virus and future influenza pandemics," Kohno told a news conference.
Kohno's team studied 300 patients age 20 to 64, giving them either a placebo or one of two doses of peramivir.
They asked the patients to fill out cards describing their flu symptoms, including cough, sore throat, nose, aches and pains, headache and fatigue.
This is the same method used in testing Roche and Gilead Sciences Inc's Tamiflu and GlaxoSmithKline and Biota Holdings Ltd's Relenza.
Peramivir cut short time of flu misery by a little more than a day on average, Sheridan said in a telephone interview.
"Everyone is interested in having alternatives to current drugs," Sheridan said. "We have an inhaled one in Relenza and we have an oral one in Tamiflu." Injected drugs can be given to people too sick to take pills.
Tamiflu, known generically as oseltamivir, and Relenza, known generically as zanamivir, can both reduce the time people are sick and also prevent infection with flu if given in time. Tamiflu is the preferred treatment for H5N1 avian influenza, which has killed 245 people in Asia, Africa and Europe since late 2003.
Experts fear H5N1 or some other new strain if flu may cause a pandemic that could kill millions of people globally, and countries are stockpiling Tamiflu and Relenza to protect against it.
Doctors are hoping peramivir will also be useful because flu mutates quickly and strains of seasonal flu that resist Tamiflu have already been found.
In February 2007, BioCryst and Shionogi signed an exclusive license agreement for Shionogi to develop and commercialize peramivir in Japan.
Peramivir is in the same class of drugs, called neuraminidase inhibitors, as Relenza and Tamiflu. Experts are hoping drug companies will develop compounds that attack flu from other directions, as well, with the idea that a "cocktail" approach will more effectively fight the virus.
Seasonal flu kills an estimated 250,000 to 500,000 people globally every year.
