Eli Lilly’s Taltz has been given the go-ahead for a new indication, which could help propel the drug to blockbuster status.
Taltz has already been approved for patients with severe plaque psoriasis and psoriatic arthritis (PsA), but the FDA recently approved the drug for ankylosing spondylitis (AS) as well. The company is banking on Taltz becoming a popular treatment for AS because many of the rheumatologists who treat patients with PsA, will also oversee their AS care as well.
Taltz will be competing with Novatis’ Cosentyx in the market for AS, which can cause severe back pain and currently impacts about 1.6 million Americans.
Taltz pulled in $252 million in global sales in the first quarter of this year, and Lily has positioned the drug to be one of its major new drivers of revenue growth, and analysts have predicted that it could reach blockbuster status by 2020.
Read the press release.