Ahithophel Weissberger

Mannkind: Overlooked Biotech With Excellent Prospects (Part V)

Jose Mcintrye:
"But the fact remains this is inhaling a growth factor and experts are going to worry, no matter what the data shows. ... How do they go about changing perceptions? Am I missing the forest for the trees or are you?" -- Jose Mcintrye

I understand you to mean that even with FDA approval, they will have trouble getting doctors on their side to prescribe it. You are absolutely right that this will be an uphill battle for Mannkind, no doubt about it. If their only selling point for Technosphere Insulin was convenience, I would call it a lost cause. But it DOES have major medical advantages, as I covered in Part 1 and Part 3. There will be early adopters and there will be those who take a wait-and-see approach. There most likely will be some patients who will persuade their doctors to prescribe it for them. It will surely start off more slowly than it would have otherwise, but I think it will build up.

Mannkind definitely has to spend time, energy, and money educating the doctors, explaining the science, and diffrentiating themselves from the other products. Mannkind is quite aware of that -- they have said as much and that's what they're planning to do. They're not neophytes. If I could just point out one more thing. When Pfizer's cancer announcement came out, none of the medical sites that were part of the clinical trials for Technosphere Insulin chose to drop out. These are the doctors who have the most intimate knowledge of the product. They were presented with the safety information and issues and made the reasoned choice to continue. With sufficient education, I think that Mannkind CAN win over the opinion leaders and front-line doctors.