The anticancer drug Avastin (Roche) may soon be used against resistant forms of resistant ovarian cancer. The European Commission has given the green light.
A new indication has been added to the long list of diseases that Avastin treats. Already used against colon, lung, breast and kidney cancers, this anticancer drug produced by Roche receives the green light from Europe in resistant ovarian cancer. The Swiss group announced it on August 6 in a press release.
The European Commission (EC) endorses the new indication for Avastin. With this decision, it follows the recommendations of the Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use (CHMP), issued last June. The anticancer drug can therefore be used in ovarian cancers that are resistant to platinum-based chemotherapy, the standard treatment. Each year, one in four women experience a recurrence because of this resistance. The treatment, which blocks the development of blood vessels necessary for the growth of tumors, must however be combined with three other anticancer drugs.
Avastin is eagerly awaited on several fronts in 2014. In July, the US health authority, the FDA, granted priority review status to the cancer drug. The aim is to open its use to advanced cancers of the cervix. And for a few months now, MPs and doctors have been campaigning for the drug to be authorized in the treatment of age-related macular degeneration (AMD). Indeed, it is 30 times cheaper than the Lucentis, considered the benchmark.
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