The Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use (CHMP) of the European Medicines Agency has adopted a positive opinion, recommending a marketing authorisation of durvalumab for the treatment of locally-advanced, unresectable non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) in adults whose tumours express PD-L1 on ≥1% of tumour cells and whose disease has not progressed following platinum-based chemotherapy and radiation therapy (CRT).

The recommendation is based on the progression-free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS) primary endpoints of the Phase III PACIFIC trial, and post-hoc subgroup analyses by PD-L1 expression requested by the CHMP.

In the PACIFIC trial, durvalumab demonstrated a statistically-significant and clinically-meaningful improvement in PFS and OS in “all-comer” patients.

The recommended label reflects most of the patients in the trial with a known PD-L1 status.

Overall survival results from the PACIFIC trial will be presented at a forthcoming medical meeting.

The positive opinion from the CHMP will now be reviewed by the European Commission, which has the authority to approve medicines for the 28 European Union member countries plus Iceland, Norway and Liechtenstein.

Earlier this year, durvalumab was approved for unresectable, Stage III NSCLC in the US, Canada, Switzerland, India, Japan and Brazil based on the Phase III PACIFIC trial.

In addition to the EU, other global health authority reviews and submissions are ongoing.

Stage III NSCLC represents approximately one-third of NSCLC incidence and was estimated to affect around 105,000 patients in the top-eight countries (China, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Spain, UK, US) in 2017.

The majority of Stage III NSCLC patients are diagnosed with unresectable tumours.

No new treatments beyond chemoradiation therapy, followed by active surveillance to monitor for progression, have been available to patients for decades.

The PACIFIC trial is a randomised, double-blinded, placebo-controlled, multi-centre trial of Imfinzi as treatment in ‘all-comer’ patients (i.e. regardless of PD-L1 status) with unresectable, Stage III NSCLC whose disease has not progressed following platinum-based chemotherapy and radiation therapy (CRT).

The trial is being conducted in 235 centres across 26 countries involving 713 patients.

The primary endpoints of the trial are PFS and OS, and secondary endpoints include landmark PFS and OS, objective response rate, and duration of response.

Sean Bohen, Executive Vice President, Global Medicines Development and Chief Medical Officer at AstraZeneca, said “The CHMP positive opinion brings European patients closer to having a treatment following chemoradiation therapy. There have been no new treatments in this setting for decades. With approximately a third of European non-small cell lung cancer patients presenting with this stage of disease, we are excited by this potential new standard of care in this curative-intent setting.”

Source: AstraZeneca