Alnylam drug lowered blood pressure when combined with pills

ATLANTA — New trial results show that a drug candidate from Alnylam Pharmaceuticals can lead to long-lasting blood pressure reduction when taken with certain commonly used pills, but some doctors are questioning how much the drug would actually be used in clinical practice.

Zilebesiran, a novel RNA interference drug dosed every six months, is intended to address a long-standing problem: despite the availability of cheap pills to lower blood pressure, there are still high rates of uncontrolled hypertension in part because people aren’t good at regularly taking their daily pills.

In a Phase 2 trial, patients with uncontrolled hypertension had 12.1 mmHg and 9.7 mmHg lower ambulatory blood pressure at three months when taking the drug in combination with the daily pills indapamide and amlodipine, respectively, compared with people taking the pills alone, according to data presented on Sunday here at the American College of Cardiology meeting.