Orphan drugs

Bo Jasper Jensen is CEO of Swedish Orphan International. The name comes from the expression ?orphan drugs?, a term used to describe the specialist drugs that we bring to market. ?Orphan? refers to the special care and attention that these drugs require in order to be developed successfully. This is the only way of ensuring that patients with rare diseases get access to the same quality of treatment as patients with more common diseases.

The rare disease patients can be found in countries all over the world. These patients have medical needs which either can not be treated with the methods that exist today or for which the existing treatment is inadequate. Today, we are aware of 7,000 rare diseases, but only around 400 of these are treatable with existing medicines, thus there are many patients who are still in desperate need for a treatment option.