Amryt Pharma signs distribution agreement for Lojuxta in Switzerland

Biopharmaceutical group Amryt Pharma has signed an exclusive distributor agreement for Lojuxta, its treatment for homozygous familial hypercholesterolemia (HoFH) - a rare, life-limiting disease that impairs the body's ability to remove bad cholesterol from the blood - in Switzerland.

The agreement is with Swiss pharmaceutical company RCC Pharma, which focuses on early access programmes in rare and orphan diseases. The company, which currently estimates that there are around 15 patients with HoFH in Switzerland, has received requests from clinicians for access to Lojuxta for Swiss patients and this agreement will now enable Amryt to respond more effectively to such requests.

The new agreement follows a distribution agreement, announced on 13 November, which covers Amryt's products for the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

Chief executive officer Joe Wiley said: "This new distribution agreement with RCC marks another key step as we expand our footprint for Lojuxta across Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa. RCC is a leading Swiss company with particular expertise in rare diseases, and this agreement will help us to bring Lojuxta to patients suffering from HoFH in Switzerland.

"We continue to work on further partnerships across our licensed territories for Lojuxta, and look forward to announcing further developments."

HoFH starts before birth and progresses rapidly, typically resulting in extremely high blood LDL cholesterol levels, which leads to aggressive and premature narrowing and blocking of blood vessels. Left untreated, heart attack or sudden death may occur in childhood or early adulthood.

At 1400 GMT, the shares were down 0.1% to 19.68p.