Finally, long awaited breast cancer drug, Tykerb, a produce of GlaxoSmithKline, is ready to enter the market as FDA gives green signal to it. Where this approval has heralded a new era for its oncology business at the same time it has provided another weapon also to fight deadly breast cancer.
According to the company officials drug Tykerb, is to be taken once daily in pill form (that would be available in the market within 2 weeks) and is meant for women who have received prior treatment with the intravenous drug Herceptin and older chemotherapy drugs called taxanes and anthracyclines.
Here it is important to know that this approval from FDA hasn’t come without any criticism because people like Barbara A. Brenner, the executive director of Breast cancer Action had already registered their annoyance, in case FDA approved such drugs. In her words:
The FDA should not approve drugs that have not shown either a survival benefit or improved quality of life for breast cancer patients with metastatic disease.
Somewhere it seems that Barbara has just looked at the darker side of the whole issue, keeping brighter side of this drug in the dark because we should not forget that clinical trials conducted recently, to know the efficacy of this drug, had dubbed this drug quite efficacious against breast cancer.
Therefore, I look at this the approval as another step forward in fight against breast cancer. In this regard following words of Dr. Steven Galson sound quite convincing:
Today’s approval is a step forward in making new treatments available for patients who have progression of their breast cancer after treatment with some of the most effective breast cancer therapies available.
Via: Komo TV