The company also said that the drug was more successful at suppressing the virus when compared to Gilead Sciences’ rival hepatitis drug, Hespera.
The viral suppression was seen in 90% of nucleoside-naive chronic hepatitis B e-antigen positive patients. A sustained, undetectable viral load is an important goal of chronic hepatitis B treatment.
“The response of most patients in this cohort to undetectable levels of viral load at three years is encouraging and these data provide important information about Baraclude for healthcare professionals,” said Hugo Cheinquer, Universidade Federal Do Rio Grande Do Sul, Brazil.
Safety events were consistent with prior experience. During the third year of treatment, eight percent of patients experienced a serious adverse event and 89% of patients had any adverse event in the third year. Two patients in this cohort died, but these deaths were not attributed to Baraclude.