Biotech / Related Ideas

[gfp927z]

Vertex (3-07) -

>>> Feuerstein's Biotech Mailbag
By Adam Feuerstein
Senior Writer
3/10/2007 10:20 AM EST
URL: http://www.thestreet.com/newsanalysis/biotech/10343484.html

F.F. writes in about Vertex Pharmaceuticals (VRTX) : "I wish you can give me an idea where Vertex is heading. I understand that Wall Street is betting on it to be next cure for hepatitis C."

That's right. Investor focus on Vertex is lasered in on telaprevir, the company's experimental hepatitis C drug in a rigorous phase II clinical trial program. I've written about Vertex and telaprevir before.

As an investor, pay attention to the upcoming meeting of the European Association of the Study of Liver Disease, taking place April 11-15. This is the first big hepatitis C meeting of the year, and Vertex should (or at least, it's hoped it will) have new data to present on telaprevir. Research abstracts will be posted at the EASL Web site after April 11, but they don't contain anything new on telaprevir. For that, we wait for the meeting to begin.

Nervousness and uncertainty about telaprevir, especially in front of this EASL meeting, are behind most of the recent weakness in Vertex shares. The biggest worry: drug-related rash that might cause patients to drop off telaprevir treatment. <<<