Ocrelizumab cuts multiple sclerosis relapses by nearly 50% compared with Rebif in two large clinical trials

In two large clinical trials, Roche's big new drug hope Ocrelizumab has cut multiple sclerosis relapses by approximately 50% compared with the older product Rebif. This has highlighted the drug’s potential in the main relapsing form of the disease.

The drug also reduced clinical disability by about a quarter in a different study of patients suffering from primary progressive multiple sclerosis (PPMS), which affects nearly 15% of patients and presently has no approved treatment.

Earlier, the Swiss company said that its new drug worked in both settings but the scale of effect has been disclosed this week only at the European Committee for Treatment and Research in Multiple Sclerosis congress in Barcelona.

According to Roche, the potency and benign side effect profile of Ocrelizumab makes it unique, whereas industry analysts see it as a possible multibillion-dollar-a-year seller, helping the group in diversifying beyond its mainstay cancer business.

Ocrelizumab reduced the annualized relapse rate by 46% and 47% compared to Merck KGaA's Rebif in the two relapsing MS trials whereas the rate of confirmed disability progression (CDP) was 37% and 43% lower. An interferon drug Rebif already reduces the number of relapses by around a third.

On Thursday, Roche's head of neuroscience clinical development Paulo Fontoura told Reuters, “On relapses, we are essentially equal to the most efficacious medicines out there and on CDP we believe we are a little bit better”.

"The findings may encourage the MS community to look more closely at earlier treatment of the disease," he said.

"While the field is concentrating on T cells ... we also know that B cells are somehow involved in the disease," Jerry Wolinsky, MD, of the University of Texas, who was on the steering committee for the trials, told MedPage Today. "We've generally gone after the T cell thinking that it was simplistically the orchestra leader, but maybe there are two or three other people leading this orchestra."