Brazil: The largest emerging pharmaceutical market for hepatitis C virus

Decision Resources, one of the world's leading research and advisory firms focusing on pharmaceutical and healthcare issues, finds that at approximately $120 million, the hepatitis C virus drug market in Brazil is among the largest emerging pharmaceutical markets for the disease. In 2008, sales of hepatitis C virus drugs in Brazil amounted to about 16 percent of the U.S. hepatitis C virus drug market (in comparison, China's and India's markets amounted to less than 10 percent each of the U.S. market). Brazil's larger market size can be attributed to the country's well established public health care system that pays for the cost of drug therapy for eligible patients.

The new Emerging Markets report entitled Hepatitis C Virus in Brazil forecasts that emerging hepatitis C virus therapies in Brazil will reach combined sales of nearly $15 million by 2013. Given Brazil's low regulatory hurdles (additional domestic clinical trials are not required) and relatively sizeable target segments, at least two novel agents--telaprevir (Vertex Pharmaceuticals/Johnson & Johnson/Mitsubishi Tanabe's VX-950/MP-424) and albinterferon-alpha-2b (Novartis/Human Genome Sciences' Albuferon)--are expected to launch towards the end of the 2008-2013 forecast period.

"Emerging therapies such as telaprevir and albinterferon-alpha-2b will find a role in the hepatitis C virus drug market in Brazil as second- and third-line therapies given the drawbacks and limitations of current treatment options and physicians' enthusiasm for novel approaches," stated Kate Hohenberg, principal director of Emerging Markets at Decision Resources.

The new report contains primary research of physicians and epidemiology study in key pharmaceutical markets of Brazil--Rio de Janeiro, Sao Paulo, Brasilia and Belo Horizonte.