Lilly's Zovant looks set to be the first therapeutic option in sepsis

Eli Lilly appears to be on the brink of achieving what has eluded thebest efforts of drug researchers for years, the development of an effective drug for sepsis. Results from a Phase III trial of the firm's Zovant (drotrecogin alfa recombinant), just published on the New England Journal of Medicine's web site (www.nejm.org), reveal that Zovant reduced the relative risk of death in patients with severe sepsis and acute organ dysfunction 19.4% compared to placebo.

Based on these results, in January Lilly filed for approval to market Zovant in the USA, the European Union and Australia, and a spokesman for the company told the Marketletter that the hope is that the drug will be granted priority review status. Analysts at Credit Suisse First Boston have suggested that Lilly could get the drug on the market before year-end, and forecast sales of around $1.2 billion in 2003.

Sepsis is a general term for a syndrome, characterized by a powerful inflammatory response to an infection, which kills 1,400 people around the world every day. Even in a country with a well-developed health care system, such as the USA, sepsis kills nearly a third of the 750,000 cases of the disease which occur each year, usually as a result of a generalized inflammatory and procoagulant response which leads to multiple organ dysfunction and failure. To date, novel treatment approaches have largely focused on interrupting the inflammatory process, but the standard of care remains treatment with antibiotics and mechanical ventilation.