Cheaper anti-cancer drug as effective as expensive disease-specific agent in treating wet AMD

An anti-cancer drug has been proven to be equally as effective in treating the most common cause of blindness in older adults as a more expensive drug specifically formulated for this purpose.

The results of a two-year trial, led by Queen's scientist Usha Chakravarthy, and published in The Lancet on July 19, show that two drug treatments Lucentis (ranibizumab; which generated second-quarter 2013 sales of$576 million for its maker, Swiss drug giant Novartis (NOVN: VX) and sold by Roche (ROG: SIX) in the USA, and Roche’s blockbuster cancer drug Avastin (bevacizumab; used off-label) are equally effective in treating neovascular or wet age-related macular degeneration (wet AMD).

Wet AMD is a common cause of sight loss in older people with at least 23,000 older people diagnosed with the condition in the UK each year. Without treatment two thirds of people with this condition will experience severe loss of sight within two years of being diagnosed.