China Medical News

When Bristol-Myers Squibb unveiled its price for Opdivo in China (set at around $1,350 for the 100mg/10mL vial, nearly half the U.S. cost of approximately $2,600), industry watchers considered it a benchmark against which future immuno-oncology therapies will look to for their pricing strategies. Now it appears at least its arch rival, Merck & Co., has taken note for PD-1 competitor Keytruda.

The New Jersey pharma has priced Keytruda at 17,918 Chinese yuan ($2,600) per 100mg/4mL vial in China on the retail front, local business media organization Caixin reported. Compared with the drug’s U.S. price of around $4,800, that’s a 46% discount—about the same taken by Opdivo—and is also about 70% of its Hong Kong price.

In addition, Merck is rolling out a patient assistance program (PAP) that will offer patients three additional months of free treatment after they pay for the first three, according to Caixin. Opdivo’s reported PAP entails six months of free drugs after five.

Keytruda was approved in the emerging market in late July. While Opdivo directly went after the lucrative lung cancer market for its first China indication, Keytruda is now approved there in advanced melanoma, even though it has already shown the ability to slash lung cancer death risk by half when paired with chemo in first-line use.

Both drugs will likely have a hard time getting onto the country’s national insurance scheme. For one thing, their costs might still be a burden on healthcare expenditure after steep discounts; second, Professor Yilong Wu, who led Opdivo’s Chinese-specific phase 3 trial, has said PD-1s are less predictive of the most suitable patients compared to targeted therapies, meaning the government will likely favor the latter for coverage.

In the second quarter, Keytruda overthrew Opdivo as the new PD-1/L1 king, with $1.67 billion in quarterly sales, versus Opdivo’s $1.63 billion.

Several domestically made checkpoint inhibitors might soon join the fray. Junshi Biosciences has also filed its PD-1 for approval in melanoma, and Jiangsu Hengrui Medicine and Innovent Biologics await Chinese decisions as well. (Source: FiercePharma)