(Adds analyst estimates on Jardiance sales and Lilly earnings,details on study, medical comment; updates share price)
By Ransdell Pierson
Sept 17 (Reuters) - Eli Lilly and Co's new Jardiancepill slashed deaths by 32 percent in patients with type 2diabetes at risk of heart attack and stroke, a finding thatcould make it a mainstay diabetes treatment and triple its use,according to researchers and analysts.
Lilly shares jumped as much as 9 percent after data from thetrial was released Thursday at a medical meeting in Stockholm.
"This is the first diabetes therapy to show robust effect inreducing cardiovascular death. It really is big news," said Dr.Bernard Zinman, director of the Diabetes Centre at Mount SinaiHospital in Toronto, who led the three-year study of 7,000people.
Because about one-half of the deaths in people with type 2diabetes are caused by cardiovascular disease, reducingcardiovascular risk is considered essential to diabetes care.Type 2 diabetes is the most common form of the disease and islinked to obesity.
Jardiance, a once-a-day pill which won U.S. approval lastyear, belongs to a new family of treatments called SGLT2inhibitors that include Johnson & Johnson Inc's Invokanaand AstraZeneca Plc's Farxiga. They lower blood sugar byinhibiting reabsorption of glucose in the kidneys.
Jardiance was developed jointly with Germany's privatelyheld Boehringer Ingelheim,
Zinman, in an interview, predicted the new study wouldprompt medical societies to recommend that Jardiance be used bytype 2 diabetics who have a history of heart disease or who areat risk of cardiovascular events.
About 26 million Americans have type 2 diabetes, accordingto federal data for 2014. The vast majority of those patientscould be candidates for Jardiance, which costs over $4,000 peryear, Morningstar analyst Damien Conover said.
JARDIANCE COULD BOOST EARNINGS
Sanford Bernstein analyst Tim Anderson more than tripled hisannual sales forecast for Jardiance and combination drugscontaining it to $2.7 billion by 2020. He cut his 2020 salesforecast for Merck & Co's Januvia, the leading member ofa competing class of oral diabetes drugs called DPP-4inhibitors, to $6 billion from $7.8 billion.
Anderson estimates Jardiance could boost Lilly's earningsper share by 8 percent on average across 2016 to 2020.
In the study, patients taking Jardiance had a 38 percentreduction in cardiovascular death, including from heart attacksand strokes. There was no significant difference in non-fatalheart attacks or non-fatal strokes.
Those taking Jardiance had a 32 percent lower risk of dyingfrom any cause, and a 35 percent lower rate of hospitalizationsfrom heart failure.
The benefits were especially impressive because they addedto protection that patients received from taking cholesterolfighters and other life-saving heart drugs, Zinman said.
"This is a wonderful thing," said Dr. Jerome Tolbert ofMount Sinai Beth Israel Hospital in New York. He has notprescribed Jardiance and similar drugs as frequently astreatments like Januvia, but expects that may change based onthe new data.
Zinman noted that Jardiance, like other SGLT2 drugs, causesweight loss and reduced blood pressure, besides lowering bothblood sugar levels and body fat, and also reduces swelling,which all help the cardiovascular system.
Lilly and Boehringer last month disclosed that Jardiance metits primary study goal, becoming the first diabetes drug to showheart-protective results in a large cardiovascular trial. Butthey did not unveil detailed data until Thursday at the medicalmeeting.
Shares of Lily closed up 6.5 percent at $89.98 on Thursday,after rising as high as $92.83.
In calculating the combined number of cardiac deaths,non-fatal heart attacks and non-fatal strokes, 14 percent fewerevents were seen in patients taking Jardiance in combinationwith standard treatments, compared with patients who tookstandard treatments alone, meeting the study's main goal.
Standard treatments included statins, which lowercholesterol, and blood pressure drugs. (Reporting by Ransdell Pierson in New York; Additionalreporting by Deena Beasley in Los Angeles; Editing by MicheleGershberg, Jeffrey Benkoe and Leslie Adler)
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