Acting Commissioner Janet Woodcock said the US FDA cleared Biogen, Inc./Eisai Co., Ltd.’s Alzheimer’s drug Aduhelm (aducanumab-avwa) based on “very, very solid” evidence and suggested that concerns about the accelerated approval stemmed from “process problems” during the review.
Woodcock Attributes Aduhelm Approval Controversy To ‘Process Problems’
US FDA’s approval after a near-unanimous advisory committee vote against Biogen’s Alzheimer’s drug is central to many critics’ arguments, but the acting commissioner says that panel did not vote on the issue of accelerated approval, and that airing of internal agency disagreements could have influenced committee members.

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Sanofi’s Dupixent, Amgen’s Uplizna, and Bristol’s Opdivo seek new indications, while J&J hopes to start a franchise with nipocalimab and Stealth’s day of reckoning approaches.
March features nearly 20 user fee goal dates, including a crowd of novel candidates for crowded areas like hemophilia, heart disease and urinary tract infections, as well as the potentially first therapies for a rare eye disease and hyperphagia of Prader-Willi syndrome.
The US FDA approval of new meningococcal and chikungunya vaccines arrived in time for the 26-28 February meeting of the CDC’s Advisory Committee On Immunization Practices, if political developments allow.
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This is an update of recommendations from the European Medicines Agency's Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use on the authorization of new medicines in the EU, and updates on EU marketing authorization changes recommended by the CHMP.
March features nearly 20 user fee goal dates, including a crowd of novel candidates for crowded areas like hemophilia, heart disease and urinary tract infections, as well as the potentially first therapies for a rare eye disease and hyperphagia of Prader-Willi syndrome.
The European Medicines Agency is set to issue opinions this week on whether pan-EU marketing approval should be granted to a number of new products.