Merck's Keytruda reduces lung cancer progression by half

Merck had said in June that  Keytruda beat chemotherapy in a survival advantage for patients with advanced lung cancer, but did not provide details.

"Chemotherapy has been the standard treatment for most patients with advanced non-small cell lung cancer for decades, but survival rates remain low," said Roger M. Perlmutter, vice president of Merck Research Laboratories. "These studies may represent a turning point in worldwide efforts to control lung cancer."

The results,  presented at the European Society of Medical Oncology meeting in Copenhagen, Denmark, were a victory for Merck, whose competitor in the same class of cancer medicines is Opdivo from Bristol-Myers Squibb. Bristol announced in August that Opdivo had missed its mark in a first-line patient trial, failing to outperform chemotherapy.

Merck, based in Kenilworth, N.J., employs about 9,200 in West Point and Upper Gwynedd in Montgomery County. The trial was restricted to patients whose lung tumors contained a PD-L1 protein.

Keytruda, a monoclonal antibody that works by increasing the ability of the body's iKmmune system to help detect and fight tumor cells, is already approved for patients who have undergone previous chemotherapy for advanced non-small-cell lung cancer. Patients in the latest study had not been treated previously for their disease.

The Food and Drug Administration has granted "breakthrough therapy designation" for Keytruda to treat relapsed classical Hodgkin's lymphoma, a blood cancer; advanced melanoma;  colorectal cancer; and non-small-cell lung cancer. The designation is intended to expedite the development and review of drugs that treat serious or life-threatening diseases or conditions.

The findings, published in the New England Journal of Medicine, "demonstrate the potential of Keytruda to change the way non-small-cell lung cancer is currently treated," said Martin Reck, head of the thoracic oncology  department at Lung Clinic Grosshansdorf in Germany.