Bristol Myers Squibb (NYSE:BMY) believes Alzheimer’s is the largest market for its newly approved schizophrenia drug, Cobenfy, which it expects to eventually generate billions of dollars in revenue.
In an interview, company executives said each treatment use they are studying for Cobenfy has multibillion dollar potential, including Alzheimer’s disease psychosis, Alzheimer’s agitation and Alzheimer’s cognition, bipolar disease and autism. But Alzheimer’s is the “really large market here,” Bristol Myers Squibb CFO David Elkins told the media on Tuesday at the JPMorgan Health Care Conference in San Francisco.
There are nearly six million Alzheimer patients in the U.S., and around half of them have psychosis, or symptoms such as hallucinations and delusions, Elkins said. Cobenfy could be the first drug specifically approved for Alzheimer’s-related psychosis, said Chief Commercialization Officer Adam Lenkowsky.
Atypical antipsychotics – medication used to treat a range of psychiatric disorders – are often used to treat psychosis in Alzheimer’s patients even though they are not approved for that purpose. But those treatments can increase the risk of death, and Cobenfy does not, according to Bristol Myers Squibb.
BMY shares advanced 32 cents to $56.06.
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