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Reducing cholesterol with the use of statin drugs is a goal that the medical community has agreed can have a major impact on health. Now, with Zocor coming off patent, there are more choices and the cost should drop significantly.

Regulators Clear 6 More Companies to Sell Generic Zocor - New York Times:

Although Teva and Ranbaxy were approved in June of 2006, they had six months exclusivity which meant that they were selling the drug for only 8% less then Merck was selling Zocor. Now there are six more companies and the prices will likely drop significantly; perhaps by 50% or more.

Current generic approvals

In June
Teva Pharmaceuticals
Ranbaxy Laboratories

This month
Cobalt Pharmaceuticals of Ontario
Aurobindo Pharma
Zydus Pharmaceuticals
Dr. Reddy’s Laboratories of India
Sandoz unit of the Swiss drug maker Novartis
Perrigo Company of Allegan, Mich

This could have an impact on other brand name statin drugs particularly Lipitor from Pfizer, the best selling of all the statin class of drugs. Many health insurance companies are certainly going to recommend that their patients ask their doctor about switching to simvastatin as a means for not only controlling cholesterol but also controlling cost. It will be interesting to see how much of an impact it does have on the sales of LIpitor. Pfizer will certainly fight this in any way they can since Lipitor is a $10 billion per year product and the patent will not expire until March of 201 and June of 2011 (depending on the crystalline form). It will definitely be interesting to see how this develops in the coming years. I don’t look for Lipitor to reach $10 billiob in sales this year.

Other Resources
FDA Approves First Generic Simvastatin

simvastatin - Yahoo! Search Results
simvastatin - Google Search
Google Blog Search: simvastatin

Technorati Tags: simvastatin, Zocor

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