18 Jan, 2021

UK's NICE recommends Gilead's blood cancer therapy Tecartus

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By Mohammad Shayan Javeed


The U.K.'s National Institute for Health and Care Excellence, or NICE, backed the use of Gilead Sciences Inc.'s Tecartus to treat patients with a type of blood cancer.

NICE recommended Tecartus, a CAR-T cell therapy developed by Gilead unit Kite Pharma Inc., for adults with mantle cell lymphoma whose disease has returned or stopped responding to other treatments. The patients must have previously received a drug called a Bruton's tyrosine kinase inhibitor, such as ibrutinib.

Mantle cell lymphoma, a rare form of non-Hodgkin lymphoma, is a type of cancer in which white blood cells called B cells become abnormal and are no longer able to fight infection.

Tecartus, or brexucabtagene autoleucel, uses a patient's white blood cells, which are extracted and modified to recognize cancer cells and then infused back into the body.

NICE, through the Cancer Drugs Fund, and Kite Pharma signed a managed access agreement to enable more data to be collected while patients receive the therapy.

NHS England and the Gilead unit agreed to a confidential discount for the use of Tecartus, which can be used to treat about 100 patients every year.

In December 2020, the European Commission gave Tecartus conditional marketing authorization to treat mantle cell lymphoma. In July that year, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration granted the medicine accelerated approval for the same indication.

Foster City, Calif.-based Gilead acquired Kite Pharma in 2017.

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