Kevin Young
Analyst · Wells Fargo
Thank you, John. Gilead generated total antiviral franchise revenues of $1.6 billion for the first quarter, up 2% over first quarter 2010 and down 4% sequentially. This sequential decline was primarily driven by U.S. performance, which decreased 7% sequentially. While demand in the U.S. increased at the prescriber level during the first quarter, there were reductions in certain state ADAP purchases and in inventory at the wholesale level. Let me immediately address the mismatch between U.S. demand and revenues. First and foremost, it is important to point out that we continue to see what you see, namely, strong and very healthy growth in underlying demand for our HIV products. The first quarter, Wolters Kluwer Health total prescription growth for both Atripla and Truvada were robust at 5% and 4%, respectively. These are some of the largest quarterly gains that we have seen in the past year. We are pleased with this high level of operational execution and the reassuring evidence that treatment guidelines supporting earlier ARV initiation and the preferred status of Gilead products are being pulled through into provider behavior. With that backdrop, the question then becomes, why did these healthy prescriber dynamics not translate into equally positive Q1 revenue numbers? There were two primary reasons for this disconnect. First, the financial strains faced by two large states' AIDS Drug Assistance Programs, namely, Florida and Texas, led to a significant decrease in ADAP purchasing as they approach the end of their budgetary cycle. The well-known state budget crisis in Florida relate not only to an increase in ADAP wait lists, but also to a temporary rolling off of some previously covered patients into industry-supported patient assistance programs until April, the beginning of the ADAP fiscal year for federal funding. Florida did not place their typical orders for Atripla and Truvada in the second half of Q1. The Texas ADAP program handled Q1 quite differently from Florida. Texas did not roll patients off drug nor did they start to wait list. They instead utilized existing inventory and stopped ordering until Congress provided more clarity on the federal budget for 2011. The recent announcements of a new ADAP drug budget for fiscal year 2011 has been positively welcomed by providers and advocacy groups. A total of $885 million has been granted. This is $50 million or 6% above the previous year's initial budget and in excess of most people's expectations. Whilst ADAP programs will not know their final 2011 allocations for another month or so, HRSA, the administrators of ADAP, did release initial funds on April the 1st to ensure that states could continue to support their patients. The very latest intelligence we have gathered at the state level indicates that there is Q2 purchasing by ADAP programs, including Florida within the last week. The second reason for the revenue versus demand disconnect was a change in inventory levels at both the large and independent regional wholesalers. In both cases, we believe the reduction in quarterly purchases was in part a reaction to the lack of ADAP pull-through. In Q1, we saw a reduction of approximately 2.5 days across our 3 major wholesalers. Collectively, these organizations handle approximately 90% of Gilead antiviral product volume. And whilst we have inventory management agreements in place, they went from the higher end of that contractual range to the lower end. The same situation occurred at the smaller wholesaler level, where we believe they reduced their stock levels below that of the end of Q4 2010. The difference here is that Gilead does not operate IMAs with these entities. I hope this information provides a helpful upfront commentary for you, and I welcome your questions later in the call. Now turning to our international performance. Europe contributed $651 million to our antiviral product sales in quarter 1, an increase of 4% year-over-year and flat sequentially. We were pleased to see this steady performance after all the economic turbulence of 2010. Whilst the 2010 austerity-mandated price reductions in Spain, Germany, Greece and Turkey are still affecting our year-on-year financial performance, we do not see any other major government interventions in Q1 2011. Moreover, there were several positive movements for our market-leading HIV products. First, a part from the 2010 introduction in Spain by a national company, we have not seen generic 3TC launched across Europe. Second, Atripla new starts continue to grow at a healthy clip. Atripla is now prescribed in 26% of patients naive to antiretrovirals. This is despite the fact that we do not have a naive indication in Europe. And third, the most significant milestone that occurred in the quarter was the change in the European AIDS consortium guidelines. These now state, and I quote, "Generic HIV drugs are becoming available and can be used as long as they replace the same drug, but do not break up recommended fixed dose combinations." We believe this endorsement will result in continued growth of our fixed dose combinations in single-tablet regimens, today, in the form of Truvada and Atripla and in the future, in the form of Truvada TMC278 and Quad. Finally, I'd like to make some closing remarks on the Letairis, for which we have seen a recent increase in ERA market share. Q1 data from our proprietary survey showed a growth from 35% share in Q4 2010 to 38% share in Q1 2011. Moreover, shares specifically in PAH centers grew from 38% to 42%. Letairis achieved revenues of $62 million in Q1 2011, a 12% increase versus Q1 2010. However, this was down 3% sequentially due to a drawdown in inventory at the specialty pharmacy level, where we do not operate IMAs. Importantly, in early March, we announced the FDA's approval of a change to the prescribing information for Letairis, where the language concerning the potential risk of liver injury was removed from the black box warning. In conjunction with this label update, monthly liver function tests are no longer required before Letairis prescription is fulfilled and distributed to the patient. LFT should be ordered and reviewed as clinically indicated. This change was due in part to post-marketing data reflecting more than 7,800 patient years of experience, which we collected through the Letairis Education and Access Program, and which were consistent with the clinical trial data used to support our NDA. The new label now reflects a major medical difference between Letairis and the older marketed ERA, bosentan, which still requires monthly monitoring. We believe this fundamental distinction will build upon the momentum we had already begun to see in Q1. In addition to the higher scientific bar now established by Letairis, there are clear benefits for PAH patients and their care givers. Not having the workload of mandated monthly liver enzyme testing has been universally well received. The Letairis medical affairs team have completed an intense month of educational activities, and whilst early, we are already seeing a noticeable pickup in patient enrollment. In closing, whilst we have the unusual effect of shortfalls in non-retail sales for our HIV drugs in Q1, it was a good quarter for continuing commercial gains and milestones, especially U.S. prescription growth. I remain confident about our prospects for the rest of 2011, both across our franchises and across our regions. I'll now turn the call over to John Martin.