Power Alley: Merck May Soon Have A New (Oral Pill) Tool -- For Fighting High LDL Cholesterol, Under A Doctor's Care...

To be sure, it is a big old honking molecule. So big, in fact, PubChem can only render the model in 2D space -- a 3D conformer gets glitchy due to the over 220 bonds per molecule (see image inset, at right). And we've covered this, since the Merck / legacy Schering-Plough Vytorin debacle of the early 2000s. . . . But a new day is dawning, now.

So progress marches onward -- and here is the latest news -- on Rahway's decade long pursuit of an additional oral LDL cholesterol lowering candidate. The day is now approaching -- so we will patiently await a potential FDA Advisory Committee date being set -- likely in late 2025, now:

. . .Merck & Co. is a step closer to bringing the first oral PCSK9 inhibitor to market. On Monday, the company announced that its experimental pill, enlicitide decanoate (formerly MK-0616), hit its main goals in two Phase III trials, significantly lowering LDL cholesterol with a safety profile comparable to placebo and existing oral treatments. . . .

Across both trials, Merck said the drug showed statistically significant and clinically meaningful results on the primary endpoint of LDL reductions and also significantly improved key secondary measures, which included non-HDL cholesterol, ApoB, and lipoprotein(a). . . .

Now you know -- and an additional tool in diabetes/cholesterol management may soon arrive -- which may well be a multi-billion dollar a year blockbuster, for Merck. Excellent!

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