Avastin, a cheap drug which is used to treat bowel cancer, has also been found effective to prevent sight loss, UK researchers have suggested. Though licensed for bowel cancer, Avastin is used across the globe to cure wet age-related macular degeneration (AMD), which is a leading cause of blindness in the UK.

Also, Avastin is quite cheaper than Lucentis, the drug licensed to treat wet, which costs around £10,000 per patient on an average. The rate of Avastin to treat wet AMD, however, would be known only after it is licensed for the disease.

Notably, an abnormal growth of blood vessels around the eye occurs in wet AMD patients. For its treatment, docs have to check the development of vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF), a natural protein.

Two clinicals trials to compare the use of Avastin and Lucentis for AMD are already underway. Their results are expected by late 2011 or early 2012.

For its part, the Department of Health, too, has issued directions to Nice (National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence) to ascertain whether Avastin could replace Lucentis in the treatment of wet AMD patients on the NHS.

Published online in the British Medical Journal (BMJ), the research suggested that doctors in countries where patients cannot afford Lucentis should start prescribing Avastin.