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 The influential patient group had been expected to post abstracts
containing detailed trial findings on its website in the coming
days, ahead of a conference planned for July in Washington, D.C.
Data in the abstracts would have been subject to an embargo, barring
their public release until the conference. But participants who were
registered to attend the meeting would have had access to their
contents, raising questions about whether that would give them
information that could influence stock market trading.
Shares of Lilly have jumped 7 percent this week, largely on Wall
Street expectations that favorable long-term effectiveness data
could emerge from the study of solanezumab, an injectable drug with
potential to become the first approved treatment to delay
progression of Alzheimer's.
A spokesman for the Alzheimer's Association told Reuters on Thursday
that the abstracts, summaries of clinical trial data to be presented
at the meeting, could be posted within a few days on a special
website for those registered for the event. He said the data would
be strictly "embargoed" from publication or distribution until the
meeting next month.
Asked if industry analysts, investors or others who might be tempted
to trade on the information would be held to the same secrecy ground
rules, he said "everyone" would be.
But on Friday, the Alzheimer's Association seemed to be
reconsidering its plans, saying, "AAIC abstracts have not been
published and there is no plan to publish them at this time. If and
when they are published, we will alert people who are registered for
AAIC to their availability."
Nicole Hebert, a spokeswoman for Lilly, said the company received
numerous queries on Thursday from people about whether embargoed
data from the trial were available. She said the company did not
have discussions with the Alzheimer's Association about its embargo
policy, and had no position on it.
Some Wall Street analysts had alerted their clients in research
notes that the Alzheimer's Association would publish the abstracts
as soon as today.
Eric Siemers, head of Lilly's Alzheimer's programs, on Thursday told
Reuters the main abstract for solanezumab would contain virtually
all important data from the study. He said that would be a departure
from usual practice, in which abstracts provide only limited
information.
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Registration for the July 18-23 meeting is open to anyone,
regardless of profession, who has paid the registration fee of up to
$1,040.
The Alzheimer's Association's wide access policy to embargoed
materials contrasts with embargo policies of other leading patient
groups, which tightly restrict such information to journalists who
sign confidentiality agreements.
The vast majority of research abstracts at the annual meeting of the
American College of Cardiology (ACC) are posted online two weeks
before the studies are presented, without an embargo.
But data for about 15 or 20 of the most important studies, called
late-breakers, are not posted. Instead, they are made exclusively
available to the media a day or so before the presentations.
"Embargos give journalists time to digest the information, maybe run
it past trusted experts and to prepare a good story," said ACC
spokeswoman Beth Casteel.
The American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) has similar
policies. "Nobody except the media has access," a spokeswoman said.
Donald Langevoort, a professor at the Georgetown University Law
Center, said the Alzheimer's Association's wide access to embargoed
materials "raises lots of red flags. At the very least it's a public
relations risk, and maybe a legal risk."
(Reporting by Ransdell Pierson; Editing by Michele Gershberg,
Richard Chang and Alan Crosby)
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