Replies to post #102738 on Biotech Values

[rkrw]

Are there any kinase drugs that have only one true target?

[biomaven0]

Ten drugs which each, independently, target 1 of the 10 things targetted by the broad spectrum drug.

Except no such drugs exist. Every approved kinase inhibitor I know of hits multiple targets to one degree or another. So really there are only "more selective" and "less selective" drugs.

Now maybe you can get lucky and find two (or more than two) selective drugs that don't have overlapping off-target effects and end up with a magic combo that is selective for just the two targets you want. I agree such a magic combo would indeed be better than any individual drug as you can optimize the doses independently. But at some point you are also going to break the bank in terms of costs.

It's worth noting that Gleevec is so successful partly because it luckily does hit other targets (like Kit) that it wasn't originally designed to hit.

Peter