Drugmakers Race for ‘Fatty Liver’ Drug to Quell Transplant Need

Fatty liver disease will be the leading reason for liver transplants within the next decade, pushing researchers and drug companies to race to discover treatments to quell its progression.

The condition is called nonalcoholic steatohepatitis—typically referred to as NASH—and no drugs are currently approved to treat it, according to the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases. It’s a form of nonalcoholic fatty liver disease where the patient has an inflamed liver and cell damage in addition to fat in the liver.

It’s becoming a “major health problem,” the Food and Drug Administration wrote June 7 in ...