FDA
Aiming to protect patients, the FDA sent lawmakers a wish list of legislative proposals intended to clarify and expand its oversight of updates to approved drug production processes.
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The FDA has some big verdicts lined up in the second quarter, including one for a closely watched obesity drug that many anticipate will further intensify competition in weight loss.
Draft guidance, issued by the FDA last week, could remove ambiguity and uncertainty that may have so far limited uptake of new approach methodologies, experts told BioSpace, particularly emphasizing the agency’s recommendations around defining NAMs’ regulatory purpose.
The FDA’s Commissioner’s National Priority Voucher program, unveiled in June 2025, is “shrouded in secrecy,” Democratic representative Jake Auchincloss said last month, as regulatory and biopharma leaders try to decode the criteria for investigational or approved drugs to receive a voucher.
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By speeding lifesaving drugs’ way to market and focusing on the underlying causes of disease, the pathway has helped save many lives.
The FDA’s year-end rush includes nine target action dates, mostly for rare disease and cancer therapies.
The program has recently become controversial as a number of high-profile advanced approvals were granted only for the drugs to fail a confirmatory trial later on. Now, the FDA has clearly laid out expectations.
The agency’s warning letter outlines Applied Therapeutics’ failure to provide adequate information regarding the clinical trial—including a dosing error for govorestat—claims that the company said it had already addressed.
Novartis, Gilead, Roche and Takeda commit to new partners in a spate of mid-sized collaborations this week. Meanwhile, Applied Therapeutics’ stock tanks 80% after govorestat is denied approval, Intra-Cellular Therapies seeks to expand Caplyta into major depressive disorder and the FDA investigates the safety of bluebird bio’s Skysona.
The cancers were diagnosed 19 to 92 months after Skysona treatment.
After extending its review period to evaluate additional submissions, the FDA ultimately denied Applied Therapeutics’ govorestat for galactosemia, citing “deficiencies” with the application. The biotech plans to meet with the regulator to discuss the best way forward for the drug.
Despite hotly debated biomarkers and failed or delayed confirmatory trials, the accelerated approval program has a track record of propelling R&D for some of medicine’s most challenging illnesses.
Currently, Eli Lilly’s GLP-1 drugs Mounjaro and Zepbound (tirzepatide) are not on the FDA’s shortage list but compounded pharmacies are still making them. That’s unprecedented.
With two decisions originally scheduled for this week already announced, including BridgeBio’s approval in ATTR-CM, the regulator has just one PDUFA on its plate this holiday week.