Schering-Plough/Merck Drug Beats Lipitor In Trial

NEW ORLEANS (Reuters) - An experimental cholesterol pill being developed by Schering-Plough Corp., and Merck and Co., handily outperformed Pfizer Inc.'s Lipitor, the world's biggest selling drug, in a trial whose results were announced on Monday.

Schering-Plough and Merck asked U.S. regulators late last year to approve their pill, called Vytorin, which combines Merck's popular Zocor (simvastatin) medicine with a newer drug called ezetimibe that prevents the intestines from absorbing "bad" LDL cholesterol.

Lipitor, with global annual sales approaching $10 billion, is a member of the same "statin" class as Zocor, a $5 billion-a-year drug that helps prevent the liver from making LDL cholesterol.

Researchers on Monday described results of a 24-week trial of Vytorin and Lipitor (atorvastatin) at the annual meeting of the American College of Cardiology in New Orleans.

The study involved 788 patients with initial LDL levels of about 180, an amount that is well above national cholesterol guidelines.

After six weeks of treatment, those taking Vytorin containing a standard 10-milligram dose of ezetimibe and a standard 20-milligram starting dose of Zocor saw their LDL levels cut by 50 percent. That compared to a 37 percent LDL reduction in patients given a standard 10-milligram starting dose of Lipitor.

Patients who took Vytorin containing 10 milligrams of ezetimibe and 10 milligrams of Zocor, saw their LDL drop by 46 percent during the 6-week period, also a statistically significant improvement over Lipitor.