Just when it looked safe …….
According to our good friend Lucille the definition of insanity is performing the exact same behavior but expecting a different outcome. We thought about Lucille today while reading yet another gem written by our good buddy Ken, who along with his good buddy Gomer, are long MannKind (NASDAQ:MNKD). We say long MannKind but in all honesty like all pump and dumpers Ken and Gomer will sell their shares once they make a sizable profit, which given the way shares of MannKind have been going just may never happen.
Like other MannKind zealots who ignore any piece of negative news regarding MannKind, the most recent being an excellent post on TheStreet.com by Adam Feuerstein (http://www.thestreet.com/story/13082829/1/mannkinds-financial-health-complicated-by-looming-100m-debt-payment.html), Ken will go to great lengths to justify his commitment to owning MannKind. Here is the latest gem written by Ken:
“In my view, the appeal of “no needles” is not enough for doctors to proactively switch patients from successful therapies to one that is only non-inferior. However, I think Afrezza will succeed over the next year as patients learn that they can take their mealtime insulin discretely and with no needles.
Sales will really take off when MannKind and Sanofi have the data to prove that Afrezza reduces complications, but in MannKind’s last conference call they did not even provide a timeframe for presenting this data.”
Now we really don’t want to embarrass Ken or claim that he’s ignorant when it comes to diabetes but stating that Afrezza will succeed because patients can take their insulin discretely is like saying patients would test their glucose levels more frequently if they did not have to prick their fingers, this is just pure fantasy and there is no data which backs up this claim.
The simple fact is people who don’t have diabetes and never had to inject insulin assume that injections are painful and the reason these patients aren’t compliant with their insulin regimen is directly related to the pain of injecting. Nothing could be further from the truth and unlike the assumptions made by people like Ken and Gomer there is actually real data on the subject. Just as pain is not the reason patients don’t test their glucose levels, it is not the reason patients are not compliant with their insulin regimen.
People like Ken and Gomer seem to believe that insulin is injected with needles that are the size of a Titan missile. That people inject insulin into muscle rather than fat tissue. That needles aren’t lubricated, which they are. That needles are huge which they aren’t. The truth is people like Ken and Gomer are basing their beliefs on assumptions not facts, but this is nothing new when it comes to MannKind pump and dumpers.
Yet a more ludicrous statement is that patients using Afrezza will experience fewer complications but there just isn’t data to prove this, at least not yet. Well we have some free advice for Ken and Gomer if you’re waiting for this data to come don’t hold your breath as it isn’t coming. Honestly this claim is out and out crazy when one looks at any of the data generated from the clinical trials. As we have stated from day one Afrezza is NOT a better insulin, it’s on par with injectable short-acting insulin, but it is NOT better.
Ken concludes his uninformed piece with the following statement;
“Be prepared for a rocky ride, but if you have a 3 year investment horizon, you have enough time for an investment in MannKind to work out.”
Ok now we know that Ken has totally lost it and is deserving of a Wacky Award. The way things are going with the Afrezza launch combined with the precarious state of MannKind’s finances there is a better than 50/50 chance that MannKind won’t be here in 3 years. But this really doesn’t matter to Ken or Gomer as they will long gone before then. This is what pump and dumpers do when they get desperate and it begins to dawn on them that the horse they bet on is not the thoroughbred they thought it was. That this horse is actually a mule.
In a last desperate attempt to recover their investment they try and convince their followers this jackass is really Secretariat. That just as Secretariat got off to a slow start MannKind will be a late bloomer and become a stock for the ages. As our good friend Lucille, who’s seen her fair share of jackasses over the years, likes to say “While it may take time for a real thoroughbred to develop, a jackass will always be jackass no matter how you try and dress it up.” Always knew there was a reason we liked Lucille.
