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Lipitor Battles Crestor to a Tie
Serving Alabama, Mississippi & Florida including Mobile, Pascagoula, Gulfport, Biloxi & Pensacola
Tue, 11/15/2011
A study recently presented at the annual meeting of the American Heart Association showed that high doses of the blockbuster cholesterol lowering drugs Lipitor and Crestor worked about equally well.
Cholesterol drugs have about 255 million prescriptions a year. Lipitor is the best selling, with sales of $7.2 billion last year, and Crestor had sales of $3.8 billion. In light of this study showing no difference in the effectiveness of the drugs, some physicians are saying the decision as to which one to take should be made on factors such as which drug is the least expensive.
Lipitor will be much cheaper than Crestor soon. The drug will be available as a generic on December 1, 2011, and will be a fraction of its current cost. In fact, nearly all statins (cholesterol lowering drugs) will be generic by next month. It is being reported that the market will go almost to zero for Crestor, which will be the last of the drugs not available in generic form.
The study, also published in The New England Journal of Medicine, was for two years and involved 1,385 patients.
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