Lilly’s psoriasis drug superior to Novartis’ Cosentyx in head-to-head trial

Pharma News: Eli Lilly announces its win in a head-to-head trial against Novartis’ big-selling Cosentyx (secukinumab) in moderate to severe plaque psoriasis.

Mirikizumab, a monoclonal antibody that binds to the p19-subunit of IL23, met the primary and all key secondary endpoints versus placebo at week 16 (superiority) and all key secondary endpoints versus Novartis’ Cosentyx (secukinumab) at week 16 (non-inferiority) and week 52 (superiority) in the OASIS-2 study.

Novartis’ Cosentyx brought in US$3.6 billion in sales last year in psoriasis and other indications like psoriatic arthritis and ankylosing spondylitis.

Lilly is investing heavily to catch up with Cosentyx and other new psoriasis antibodies, including AbbVie’s Skyrizi (risankizumab), Janssen’s Tremfya (guselkumab) and Sun Pharma’s Ilumya (tildrakizumab) which are PBS listed.

“We are pleased with the positive results observed in the mirikizumab psoriasis development program (OASIS). Mirikizumab has the potential to be a meaningful treatment option for people living with psoriasis,” said Andrew Blauvelt, M.D., M.B.A., president of Oregon Medical Research Centre and a lead investigator in the OASIS program. “The data builds on our understanding of IL-23 inhibition in psoriasis and possible future applications.” 

Lilly is also running large-scale phase III trials of mirikizumab in ulcerative colitis (UC) and Crohn’s disease to expand the potential uses of the monoclonal antibody.

Lilly expects topline results for the Phase III induction data in UC in 2021 and for the Phase III Crohn’s data in 2022.