The COPD Pipeline XXXII.

COPD accounts for approximately 26 million prescriptions per year in the United States. According to an analysis by Novartis R&D, the U.S. market for COPD drugs was running at $11.8 billion in 2012, 70% of that fi gure being almost equally divided between a LAMA, namely tiotropium, and the 2 ICS/LABA combinations. Th eir estimate is that the COPD drug market will increase by 24.4% to $14.8 billion on 2017. Almost all of that increase will be due to the entry of LABA/LAMA combinations such as Novartis’s QVA149, their indacaterol/glycopyrronium combination. Th e absolute dollar amounts of each of our present COPD drug classes would remain essentially unchanged. Th ey project that in the next 5 years, growth throughout the pharmaceutical industry will be mainly based on drugs already in the market. If all this turns out to be accurate there will be no new classes of COPD treatments such as anti-infl ammatory drugs or anti-smoking drugs whatsoever in the foreseeable future. Th e source of these depressing predictions is http://www.novartis.com/cs/www.novartis.com-v4/downloads/ investors/event-calendar/2012/9-turning-rd-excellence-into-commercialsuccess.pdf