Originally published June 23 2005
Diabetes treatment projected to be most profitable sector of drug industry
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews Editor
A recent CNN article says pharmaceutical companies are focusing on diabetes treatments to make profits in the future, as baby boomers are getting older and more and more obese Americans are being diagnosed.
As pharmaceutical companies survey where the most potential will be in coming years, many are settling on diabetes, which is on the rise as America's baby boomers are getting older and the rest of the country battles a growing weight problem.
In the United States, 18.2 million people have diabetes, including 13 million diagnosed with the disease and an estimated 5.2 million who don't know they have it, according to the American Diabetes Association and the National Institutes of Health.
Diabetes is the sixth leading cause of death in America and every year another 1.3 million Americans are diagnosed, according to the NIH.
Diabetes is a group of diseases causing defects in insulin production, hampering the ability to turn sugar into energy.
Complications from diabetes include diseases of the heart, kidneys and nervous systems, stroke, high blood pressure, blindness and amputations.
The NIH tallies total medical costs from diabetes at $92 billion in 2002, with an additional $40 billion from work loss, disability and death.
Diabetes-related drug sales are expected to jump 12 percent annually through 2011 worldwide, compared to industry-wide sales growth of 6 percent, said the Bernstein report.
Eli Lilly & Co. (down $0.38 to $56.99, Research) and Novo Nordisk (up $0.21 to $50.63, Research) each made more than $2 billion last year from insulin and Sanofi-Aventis (down $0.50 to $43.80, Research) made $1 billion.
TZDs, pills that help the body make its own insulin, are also profitable.
GlaxoSmithKline (up $0.18 to $50.18, Research) made more than $2 billion from TZD sales in 2004 and Takeda Pharmaceutical made more than $1 billion.
"The diabetes market appears poised to post accelerating growth over the coming years," wrote Chris Shibutani, analyst for J.P. Morgan, in a Wednesday report.
Pfizer has partnered with Sanofi and Nektar Therapeutics to produce Exubera.
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