Pfizer Inc.’s Paxlovid has become such a part of the COVID-19 treatment scene in the U.S. that it’s easy to forget it’s only authorized for emergency use. That could soon change. The FDA is convening its Antimicrobial Drugs Advisory Committee March 16 to consider Pfizer’s NDA for the co-packaged nirmatrelvir and ritonavir treatment.
Despite the new Medicare inflation rebate, the U.S. price of 27 Part B drugs grew faster than inflation in the last quarter of 2022, triggering the new rebate provision in the Inflation Reduction Act. The manufacturers of those single-source drugs will be billed for the rebates in 2025, but Medicare beneficiaries should see a drop in their coinsurance for those drugs, for the next quarter at least. According to the Biden administration, the decrease in out-of-pocket costs for those drugs will range from $2 to as much as $390 per average dose from April 1 through June 30.
The NMPA accepted a BLA from Astellas Pharma Inc. for enfortumab vedotin, which is designed for the treatment of patients with locally advanced or metastatic urothelial cancer who previously received treatment with a PD-1/L1 inhibitor and platinum-based chemotherapy. “In China, there were nearly 86,000 new cases of bladder cancer in 2020, and we are working with the NMPA to seek approval for enfortumab vedotin for patients with advanced stage disease,” said Ahsan Arozullah, senior vice president and head of development therapeutic areas at Astellas.
Regulatory snapshots, including global drug submissions and approvals, clinical trial approvals and other regulatory decisions and designations: Ellipses, Innoviva, Mirum, Sapience, Truebinding, Xortx.
After placing a temporary hold on the merger between F-star Therapeutics Ltd. and Sino Biopharmaceutical Ltd.’s Invox Pharma Ltd., citing “unresolved national security risks,” the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) has finally cleared the merger to proceed. London-based Invox announced its plans to acquire F-star in June 2022 for $161 million to build up the presence of its parent company, Sino Biopharm Ltd., outside of China.
The U.S. FDA has accepted Mesoblast Ltd.’s BLA resubmission for its allogeneic stem cell treatment remestemcel-L in children with steroid-refractory acute graft-vs.-host disease (SR-aGVHD). Mesoblast received a complete response letter from the FDA in October 2020 for remestemcel-L even though approval was highly anticipated after the FDA’s Oncologic Drugs Advisory Committee voted 9-1 that the stem cell therapy showed evidence of efficacy as a treatment for SR-aGVHD in children.
A California man agreed to settle insider trading charges related to Tokyo-based Astellas Pharma Inc.’s buyout offer of San Francisco-based Audentes Therapeutics Inc. in December 2019 for $3 billion. Mahmoud Abdelkader’s wife worked for Audentes and allegedly determined from “facts he learned from his wife, that there was a high likelihood of Audentes being acquired,” the SEC’s complaint said.
Regulatory snapshots, including global submissions and approvals, clinical trial approvals and other regulatory decisions and designations: Cathera, Visby Medical.
The U.S. Veterans Health Administration (VA) is being applauded for doing what Medicare has refused to do – provide coverage for Leqembi (lecanemab) in the early stages of Alzheimer’s disease. Under the March 13 VA decision, the Eisai Co. Ltd. drug, which was partnered with Biogen Inc. and granted accelerated approval in January, will be listed as a nonformulary therapy that must be prescribed by a VA-board certified neurologist, geriatric psychiatrist or geriatrician who specializes in treating dementia.
China’s NMPA approved Shanghai Shengdi Pharmaceutical Co. Ltd.’s adebrelimab (SHR-1316) for first-line treatment of extensive-stage small-cell lung cancer (ES-SCLC) in combination with chemotherapy. The approval in mainland China makes adebrelimab the third domestic PD-L1 monoclonal antibody to make it to the domestic market. Shanghai Shengdi is a subsidiary of Jiangsu Hengrui Medicine Co. Ltd.
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