The US Food & Drug Administration oncology drug review team is getting a lot of attention for cleaning up accelerate approval indications after confirmatory studies fail.
Accelerated Approval Is For Patients, Not Sponsors – US FDA’s Pazdur
Biotech sponsors understandably discuss accelerated approval as an important consideration in development plans. But the head of the US FDA oncology program has a reminder for them: the pathway is intended to serve patients – not drug companies.

More from Approval Standards
A risk-based approach to human cell therapies and tissue-based products could incentivize development and prevent bad actors from taking advantage of the current FDA system.
US FDA Commissioner nominee Martin Makary is being embraced by industry, and Senate Democrats, as a more traditional pick than other Trump Administration nominees, but the Make America Healthy Again agenda still is clearly coming to the agency.
The Pink Sheet's list of EU centralized approvals of new active substances has been updated to include four new products, one of which is Vimkunya, Bavarian Nordic's chikungunya vaccine.
The FDA generic drugs team’s first public workshop of the second Trump Administration ended with a request that industry amplify the value it finds from public engagement.
More from Pathways & Standards
Novartis is planning to file EU and US marketing applications for an intrathecal formulation of its spinal muscular atrophy gene therapy, Zolgensma, in H1 2025.
The FDA’s accelerated approval draft guidance has left stakeholders seeking clarification of the process for determining a surrogate marker or intermediate clinical endpoint is reasonably likely to confirm clinical benefit.
A risk-based approach to human cell therapies and tissue-based products could incentivize development and prevent bad actors from taking advantage of the current FDA system.