Sage ‘encouraged’ by initial Zurzuvae sales in postpartum depression, but no word on major depression plans

Doc­tors or­dered 120 pre­scrip­tions of Zurzu­vae, the new pill for post­par­tum de­pres­sion, in the fi­nal days of De­cem­ber once the drug be­came avail­able, its man­u­fac­tur­er Sage Ther­a­peu­tics an­nounced Wednes­day.

The high­ly-an­tic­i­pat­ed pill — the first ever for a form of de­pres­sion that af­fects 500,000 moth­ers in the US each year — is al­ready on track to beat sales of its pre­de­ces­sor Zul­res­so, an oner­ous in­fu­sion that re­quired a three-day hos­pi­tal stay. Pre­scrip­tions of Zurzu­vae, in con­trast, are be­ing de­liv­ered di­rect­ly to pa­tients’ homes, the com­pa­ny said. But Sage didn’t pro­vide an up­date on the pill’s un­cer­tain fu­ture as a po­ten­tial treat­ment for ma­jor de­pres­sion, a big­ger and more lu­cra­tive mar­ket.

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