FDA
Analysts called the approval a much-needed win for Novo Nordisk, but warned that the company could struggle to grow sales once rival drugs come to market.
FEATURED STORIES
Representatives of companies including AbbVie, Eli Lilly, Johnson & Johnson and Merck have voiced concerns about the FDA’s approach to pre-approval inspections.
With notable therapies from Biogen, Sarepta and MacroGenics failing to show efficacy in pivotal or confirmatory trials, experts question the use of biomarker evidence for approval while one former regulator insists that a “failed trial is not a failed drug.”
Coming up in the back half of December, the FDA will issue a verdict on Vanda Pharmaceuticals’ gastroparesis drug tradipitant, which it rejected last September, triggering a very public dispute with the company.
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Despite the lack of a randomized clinical trial to support eflornithine’s efficacy, the regulator approved US WorldMeds’ oral maintenance treatment for high-risk neuroblastoma in adults and children.
This week, we discuss the two major FDA approvals for sickle cell from Vertex/CRISPR and bluebird bio; Axcella and the future of long-covid treatments, Vanda’s $100m purchase and AI regulatory developments in Europe.
Friday’s FDA approval of Vertex-CRISPR’s Casgevy and bluebird bio’s Lyfgenia has immediately revealed startling differences between these two gene therapies: price and a black-box warning.
Along with CRISPR/Cas9-based Casgevy—developed by Vertex Pharmaceuticals and CRISPR Therapeutics—the regulator on Friday approved bluebird bio’s Lyfgenia, a second gene therapy for sickle cell disease.
The Swiss pharma’s Fabhalta, a Factor B inhibitor, is the first FDA-approved oral monotherapy for adults with the rare blood disorder paroxysmal nocturnal hemoglobinuria.
Lilly’s Jaypirca (pirtobrutinib) can now be used to treat chronic lymphocytic leukemia or small lymphocytic leukemia that had progressed from at least two prior lines of therapy, in addition to its previously-approved indications.
The Ogsiveo tablets are the first approval therapy for the rare subtype of soft tissue sarcomas, which can lead to severe pain and disability and previously were treated primarily through surgery.
The company’s Truqap, in combination with its endocrine therapy Faslodex, has been approved by the regulator for adult patients with advanced HR-positive breast cancer with specific biomarker alterations.
Xtandi is now approved to treat nonmetastatic castration-sensitive prostate cancer with biochemical recurrence at high risk for metastasis with or without a gonadotropin-releasing hormone analog therapy.
The company won the third FDA approval in a month for the anti-PD-1 blockbuster, allowing its first-line use in locally advanced unresectable or metastatic gastric or gastroesophageal junction adenocarcinoma.