While the annual State of the Union address has morphed over the years from a summation of the state of the U.S. government and the president’s legislative agenda into political theater on both sides of the aisle, President Donald Trump did include some recommendations to Congress in his Feb. 24 speech. Among those recommendations was a request for Congress to codify his most-favored-nation pricing policy for prescription drugs.
The U.S. FDA rolled out its anticipated “plausible mechanism” draft guidance, enabling ultrarare disease drug developers to generate evidence of effectiveness and safety to support approval when randomized controlled trials are not possible due to small patient populations.
Following a clinical hold last October of Intellia Therapeutics Inc.’s Magnitude and Magnitude-2 phase III trials of CRISPR/Cas9 gene editing therapy nexiguran ziclumeran (nex-z) to treat transthyretin amyloidosis with cardiomyopathy (ATTR-CM) and polyneuropathy (ATTR-PN), respectively, the U.S. FDA lifted the hold on Magnitude-2, pushing the company’s shares up by 22% in early trading Jan. 27.
After selling off amyotrophic lateral sclerosis therapeutics last month, Tanabe Pharma America Inc. emerged a forerunner in another rare disease space with positive top-line phase III data of dersimelagon (MT-7117) for erythropoietic protoporphyria/X-linked protoporphyria.
The good news is that the U.S. Congress is on track to pass a slate of fiscal 2026 spending bills before the current continuing resolution expires Jan. 30. So, barring any last-minute disputes or legislative hostage-taking, there should be no repeat of last year’s 43-day shutdown that impacted NIH grants and activities.
After selling off amyotrophic lateral sclerosis therapeutics last month, Tanabe Pharma America Inc. emerged a forerunner in another rare disease space with positive top-line phase III data of dersimelagon (MT-7117) for erythropoietic protoporphyria/X-linked protoporphyria.
The U.S. FDA has approved Zycubo (copper histidinate) as the first treatment for Menkes disease, a rare, genetic disease affecting children who cannot absorb copper through their intestines, leading to seizures, weak muscles, a failure to thrive and, ultimately, if left untreated, an early death by age 3.
A second complete response letter issued by the U.S. FDA for Atara Biotherapeutics Inc.’s allogeneic T-cell immunotherapy Ebvallo (tabelecleucel) for Epstein-Barr virus positive post-transplant lymphoproliferative disease is “a complete reversal of position” by the agency, which had previously confirmed the single arm Allele trial was enough to support a BLA under the accelerated approval pathway, the company said.
Moving away from a one-size-fits-all approach, the U.S. FDA's CBER released details Jan. 11 about how it’s leveraging its growing experience with cell and gene therapies (CGTs) to exercise greater regulatory flexibility in chemical, manufacturing and control requirements for the products.
The newly released 2026 edition of Clarivate’s Drugs to Watch report highlights 11 potential blockbusters that could change treatment paradigms for patients.
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