Future Retirement Success
  • Politics
  • Business
  • Investing
  • Stocks
  • Politics
  • Business
  • Investing
  • Stocks

Future Retirement Success

Investing

Journavx: A Promising Opioid Alternative, but Not a Silver Bullet

by January 31, 2025
January 31, 2025
Journavx: A Promising Opioid Alternative, but Not a Silver Bullet

Jeffrey A. Singer

On January 30, the Food and Drug Administration announced it approved the first of a new class of pain reliever drugs as an alternative to opioids. Journavx (generic name suzetrigine) was found to work as well as hydrocodone (Vicodin, Norco) to treat moderate to severe postoperative pain in two Phase 3 clinical trials, one with patients who underwent bunionectomy surgery and another on patients who underwent abdominoplasty. 

The drug is unique in that, unlike opioids, which directly target the brain to dull the perception of pain, or non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) like ibuprofen and naproxen, which reduce inflammation and pain at the injury site, suzetrigine blocks the nerves that transmit pain signals to the brain.

The Phase 1 trials of suzetrigine took place in 2021. The entire approval process took only about four years, which is not typical for the FDA. The process usually takes about 10–15 years, and the Phase 1–3 clinical trials process generally takes around 6–7 years, followed by 10 months for standard FDA review (6 months for accelerated review). According to a report from the trade association BIO, 90 percent of drugs don’t make it through the Phase 1 approval process. A 2024 study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association estimated the mean cost of bringing a drug to market from 2000 to 2018 to be “$879.3 million when both drug development failure and capital costs were included.”

The FDA accelerated suzetrigine’s approval through its Overdose Prevention Framework, streamlining the clinical trial and approval process for opioid substitutes and harm-reduction products such as overdose antidotes. This demonstrates that the FDA can dramatically reduce the regulatory burden on new drug development when it deems a problem urgent. However, the FDA—not the patients suffering from specific conditions—decides what qualifies as urgent.

The FDA created the accelerated framework based on the debunked narrative that the overdose crisis was caused by doctors hooking their patients on opioids. As I have written, the overdose crisis resulted from a growing population of nonmedical drug users accessing drugs in the increasingly dangerous black market caused by drug prohibition. Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) surveys begun in 2002 consistently show the addiction rate to prescription pain pills has never exceeded 0.8 percent of adults over age 18 (see attached graph). 

As early as 2017, I pointed out that overdose rates began to climb as doctors started cutting back on opioid prescribing, which reduced nonmedical users’ access to diverted pain pills and drove them to more dangerous heroin and, now, fentanyl.

Nevertheless, Journavx appears to be a real breakthrough drug, opening the door for a new class of pain relievers for patients to access. This is good news.

A caveat: Pain is subjective, and analgesics affect individuals differently. The clinical trials found it roughly equivalent to a standard dose of hydrocodone. Hydrocodone is not as potent as oxycodone and doesn’t work for everyone, though it works for many people.

Clinicians must still be ready to prescribe oxycodone or something even more potent if this new drug fails to provide the relief patients require. I worry that many doctors might resort to prescribing this drug exclusively and abandon opioid alternatives altogether due to fear of disciplinary action from cops practicing medicine.

0
FacebookTwitterGoogle +Pinterest
previous post
Abramovich faces fresh calls for HMRC probe over potential £1bn tax bill
next post
Should the US Respond to “Unfair” Trade Practices?

You may also like

Immersive Outreach Programs May Be a Better Investment...

May 17, 2024

George Will: Overcoming Constitutional Queasiness to Head Off...

August 10, 2023

Perttu v. Richards Brief: Defending the Right to...

January 22, 2025

Presidents Must Take Accountability for the Officers They...

May 1, 2023

Friday Feature: Boone Prairie School

May 5, 2023

300 Years Later, Adam Smith Is Still Indispensable

June 16, 2023

Nigeria’s CBDC Was Not Chosen. It Was Forced

May 15, 2023

A “Bidenomics” Cautionary Tale

July 7, 2023

Frederick Douglass: Self-Made Man

February 20, 2024

Trump Proposes to Socialize IVF

August 30, 2024

    Get free access to all of the retirement secrets and income strategies from our experts! or Join The Exclusive Subscription Today And Get the Premium Articles Acess for Free

    By opting in you agree to receive emails from us and our affiliates. Your information is secure and your privacy is protected.

    Recent Posts

    • Friday Feature: Incubate Debate

      June 6, 2025
    • Risch urges ‘top to bottom’ USAID spending review after waste, fraud exposed

      June 6, 2025
    • Universities in Libertarian Land

      June 6, 2025
    • Elon Musk may speak to Trump aides in push to calm feud

      June 6, 2025
    • Everyone Talks About Leaving a Better Planet for Our Children: Why Don’t We Leave Better Children for Our Planet?

      June 6, 2025
    • MARK HALPERIN: Democrats try to construct a Frankenstein candidate while JD Vance gains momentum for 2028

      June 6, 2025

    Categories

    • Business (8,149)
    • Investing (2,013)
    • Politics (15,545)
    • Stocks (3,130)
    • About us
    • Privacy Policy
    • Terms & Conditions

    Disclaimer: futureretirementsuccess.com, its managers, its employees, and assigns (collectively “The Company”) do not make any guarantee or warranty about what is advertised above. Information provided by this website is for research purposes only and should not be considered as personalized financial advice. The Company is not affiliated with, nor does it receive compensation from, any specific security. The Company is not registered or licensed by any governing body in any jurisdiction to give investing advice or provide investment recommendation. Any investments recommended here should be taken into consideration only after consulting with your investment advisor and after reviewing the prospectus or financial statements of the company.

    Copyright © 2025 futureretirementsuccess.com | All Rights Reserved