Sanofi-Aventis received a rare piece of good news about diet drug Acomplia (rimonabant) on March 26th when Britain's National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) recommended that the diet pill be made available to obese and overweight patients through the U.K.'s National Health Service.

NICE assesses the cost-effectiveness of treatments for use by the state-run National Health Service, and its determination endorsing provision of Acomplia to patients comes as a bit of a surprise, particularly since a German panel earlier classified it as a "lifestyle" drug and ruled that the country's health insurance scheme did not have to reimburse its cost.

The fact that obese and overweight patients in Britain and Wales will soon be able to receive the costly drug as part of their government health coverage also should provide a boost to Acomplia sales, which have been a major disappointment totaling only $123 million worldwide last year.

Hopes for Acomplia, once touted as a multibillion-dollar blockbuster drug, took a major hit last year when a U.S. FDA advisory panel recommended against its approval after it was linked to depression and suicidal thoughts. Sanofi-Aventis has said it hopes to present new clinical trial results to regulators in 2009.

"Sanofi-Aventis is delighted that (NICE) has recommended that Acomplia should be made available for the management of obese and overweight National Health Service (NHS) patients, and believes that Acomplia is a valuable addition to the limited treatment options currently available," Sanofi said in a statement.

Dr David Haslam, Clinical Director of Britain's National Obesity Forum, said: “It is excellent news that NICE has recognized that doctors should be able to prescribe rimonabant on the NHS for the right patient.

"Patients who are obese or overweight are at significant risk of developing heart disease and type 2 diabetes, so it is vital that doctors have a full range of options, alongside lifestyle interventions, to help patients lose weight and cut their risk of disease," Haslam said.

"Rimonabant, in addition to diet and exercise, provides clinically meaningful weight loss and improvements in risk factor for cardiovascular disease. We
now need to make sure that when final guidance is issued primary care trusts provide funding to allow doctors to be able to provide the medicine to those patients who could benefit from it," he added.