Immunotherapy pushes the survival margin for kidney cancer patients further forward: Both Pfizer and the Darmstadt-based Merck Group and the US company Merck & Co can hope for appropriate approvals for their cancer immunotherapy drugs Bavencio and Keytruda.
For both active ingredients, the manufacturers presented test results at a specialist conference in recent days, which in the treatment of renal cell carcinomas to significant advantages over the previous standard therapy Sutent (sunitinib) interpret – similar to last two drugs of the US company Bristol- Myers Squibb.
French oncologist Bernard Escudier of the French Cancer Research Center Gustave Roussy speaks of a second revolution in renal cancer therapy in the prestigious New England Journal of Medicine in the past 12 years.
It is a therapeutic area with significant medical needs and economic potential for new, better medicines. In Germany, about 15,000 people get kidney cancer each year. Worldwide, the number of new cases is estimated at more than 400,000. Market leaders in drugs so far are Pfizer with Sutent and Bayer with the drug Nexavar.
