Singapore, Sep 08, 2010: The emergence of new agents which potentially could affect disease progression could see the Alzheimer's disease drug market more than triple, from $4.3 billion in 2009 to $13.3 billion in 2019 in the US, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, the UK and Japan, according to Decision Resources, a research firm for pharma and healthcare issues based in the US.

The Pharmacor (Decision Resources' flagship advisory service)2010 findings from the topic entitled Alzheimer's Disease reveal that growth will be driven primarily by the first biologic agents to enter the market—Eli Lilly's solanezumab and Johnson & Johnson/Pfizer's bapineuzumab. These anti-beta-amyloid monoclonal antibodies (MAbs), which have the potential to slow the rate of neurodegeneration and cognitive decline, together will earn more than $6.9 billion in the world's major pharma markets in 2019.

Currently, the market for Alzheimer's disease therapies is dominated by acetylcholinesterase inhibitors (AChEIs), which treat only cognitive symptoms without modifying the course of the disease. Although interviewed experts indicate that the anti-beta-amyloid MAbs have the most clinical and commercial promise in Alzheimer's disease, continued use of symptomatic agents such as the AChEI donepezil (Eisai/Pfizer's Aricept, Bracco's Memac) will help to maintain the AChEI drug class over the next decade.

"Despite increased generic competition and the launch of more-expensive and potentially more-efficacious therapies, AChEI sales will be buoyed through 2019," said Decision Resources Director, Dr Bethany Kiernan. "This will be largely due to an overall market expansion driven by increases in the number of drug-treated patients but also, to a lesser extent, by the launch of new formulations of branded AChEIs."