AstraZeneca, Daiichi's breast cancer drug gets broader U.S. approval (updated)
18/01/2021 08:13
(Adds details on payment and drug, executive comment,
background)
Jan 18 (Reuters) - AstraZeneca AZN.L and Daiichi Sankyo's
4568.T breast cancer drug has been approved as a treatment for
a certain type of advanced gastric cancer in the United States,
the British drugmaker said on Monday.
Drugmakers are using biomarker-driven drugs to treat
patients with rare tumours. AstraZeneca made a $7-billion bet on
the treatment, Enhertu, when it partnered with Daiichi in 2019
in a direct challenge to Roche ROG.S .
The treatment has now been approved as a therapy for
patients with previously treated HER2-positive advanced gastric
cancer, AstraZeneca said, adding it now owes $115 million in
milestones to Japan's Daiichi for the latest indication.
"Today's approval of Enhertu represents the first
HER2-directed medicine approved in a decade for patients with
HER2-positive metastatic gastric cancer," Dave Fredrickson,
executive vice-president of AstraZeneca's oncology business unit
said.
Though Enhertu targets the HER2 protein typical of certain
breast cancers, the marker is found in some other rare and
difficult cancers as well, and approvals may add to the sales,
albeit in smaller numbers for a niche market. urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL4N2DB2G8
AstraZeneca said about one in five gastric cancer patients
are HER2 positive and slightly more than 26,000 Americans are
likely to be diagnosed with gastric cancer this year, according
to the American Cancer Society.
The London-listed company said the approval by the U.S. Food
and Drug Administration was based on results from the
DESTINY-Gastric01 trial conducted in Japan and South Korea.
urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nRSR9823La
(Reporting by Tanishaa Nadkar in Bengaluru;
Editing by Arun Koyyur)
((tanishaa.nadkar@thomsonreuters.com; +919730172534; Twitter -
@TanishaaNadkar))