Merck, CSL sign US flu vaccine distribution deal
Drugmaker Merck & Co. said Monday it’s entered an exclusive deal with flu vaccine maker CSL Biotherapies to distribute its Afluria seasonal flu shot in the U.S. starting next fall.
The deal, which pays vaccine powerhouse Merck based on how many Afluria doses it distributes, is to run from the 2010-11 flu season through 2015-16. Financial details were not disclosed.
CSL Biotherapies, based in King of Prussia, Pa., is part of CSL Ltd. of Melbourne Australia, which has long provided seasonal flu vaccines to Australia, New Zealand and more than 15 countries in Europe, South America and Asia. CSL won approval to sell Afluria here in September 2007, making it the fifth manufacturer for the U.S. market.
CSL has distributed Merck vaccines in Australia for decades.
Whitehouse Station, N.J.-based Merck, which pioneered development of many life-saving children’s vaccines, made influenza vaccine from 1945 through 1982, then left the field.
With the Afluria deal, Merck will be marketing eight of the 10 vaccines U.S. health officials recommend for adults, including Pneumovax 23, recommended for the elderly and people with weak immune systems to protect against 23 strains of pneumococcal disease.
“Our (sales) folks are in (offices) talking with individual physicians about the number of people who should be getting pneumococcal vaccine and aren’t,” about one-third of that group, said John Grabenstein, Merck’s head of medical policy for adult vaccines.
Those sales reps can urge doctors to get the same patients to also use CSL’s seasonal flu vaccine, he said.
CSL produced about 8 million Afluria doses for the U.S. market this year, up from 6 million last year. Grabenstein wouldn’t say how much the companies hope to distribute next year.
Afluria is approved for vaccinating people aged 18 and older.
The Food and Drug Administration recently licensed CSL’s new vaccine packing facility in Kankakee, Ill. Using bulk vaccine made in Australia, the plant will fill single-dose syringes and package them for the U.S. market. It will be able to prepare 10 million doses initially and 20 million doses a year when it hits full capacity.
Merck later this year is to acquire Schering-Plough Corp. for $41.1 billion, a deal that will help it leapfrog to the No. 2 drug company worldwide with strong positions in traditional pills, biotech drugs, vaccines and consumer and animal health products.
Merck’s other adult vaccines include Zostavax against shingles, Vaqta against hepatitis A, Recombivax HB for hepatitis B, and Gardasil, a vaccine to block key strains of a virus that causes cervical cancer and genital warts. Gardasil is the top seller, with revenue of about $1.4 billion a year. It now has U.S. approval for adolescent girls and women up to age 26, but could soon win approval for use in young men, who can pass the virus to sexual partners.
Shares of Merck rose 90 cents, or 2.9 percent, to $32.15 in afternoon trading. — AP
- TechNews
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