Amgen Sets Annual List Price for Osteoporosis Drug Evenity at $21,900

One week after the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved Amgen’s Evenity, the California-based company has set the list price for the medication at $21,900.

Evenity was approved for the treatment of osteoporosis in postmenopausal women at high risk for fracture. Approximately 10 million people in the United States suffer from osteoporosis. Many people diagnosed with osteoporosis are susceptible to fractures related to the disease. There are about 2 million osteoporosis-related bone breaks annually. Once one of these types of bone breaks occurs, the patient is far more likely to experience another one within a year. Annually in the United States, osteoporosis-related fractures account for 432,000 hospital admissions and 180,000 nursing home admissions. With an aging population in the U.S., treatment-related costs for osteoporosis are expected to reach approximately $25.3 billion by 2025, Amgen said. Data shows that only 20 percent of women who have experienced a fracture receive any type of osteoporosis treatment during the first year post fracture.

On Monday, Amgen announced its pricing plan for the medication as it prepares to launch the drug in the United States. Evenity will have a list price of 1,825 per dose, or $21,900 for a full course of treatment, which is 12 monthly doses.

Amgen’s Evenity is an inhibitor of a protein called sclerostin, which stops bone production and increases breakdown. Evenity can rapidly increase bone formation and simultaneously reduce bone resorption. Evenity is designed to help rebuild bone rapidly in patients over the course of 12 months. Evenity is intended for short-term treatment options for postmenopausal women. The company’s other osteoporosis treatment, Prolia, is intended for chronic treatment of the disease. Data from late-stage trials showed that Evenity increased bone mineral density in patients and also decreased the risk of fractures. Prolia increases bone mass in the patients.

Murdo Gordon, executive vice president of Global Commercial Operations at Amgen, told Reuters that Amgen set the price for Evenity so it is “clearly a better value than existing agents that build bone.” Other drugs that build bone include Eli Lilly’s Forteo and Radius Health’s Tymlos, take at least 18 months to two years to do so, in comparison to the 12 months for Evenity. Amgen said the list price for Evenity is “34 to 74 percent lower than currently available anabolic agents over their full course of therapy.”

Citing IBES data from Refinitiv, Reuters reported that analysts have pegged annual Evenity revenue at $274 million a year by 2024. Sales of Prolia are forecast to hit $3.3 billion by 2024, Reuters said.

Evenity launches with a boxed warning due to concerns over cardiovascular risks associated with the drug. Because of those risks, analysts predict that will impact sales of the drug.

“Osteoporosis is a silent disease that can lead to devastating consequences. Unfortunately, only 20 percent of women who have experienced a fracture receive any type of osteoporosis treatment post-fracture,” Gordon said in a statement. “This is unacceptable for the millions of women who have suffered from an osteoporosis-related fracture. We need to urgently make postmenopausal osteoporosis a women’s health priority.”

https://www.biospace.com/article/amgen-sets-annual-list-price-for-osteoporosis-drug-evenity-at-21-900/