Bavarian Nordic's Immunotherapy Product Candidate CV-301 Shows Promise in Breast and Ovarian Cancer
The NCI-funded study enrolled 26 heavily pretreated patients with metastatic breast or ovarian cancer and assigned them to monthly vaccinations with CV-301. Among the 12 patients with breast cancer, median time to progression (TTP) was 2.5 months and median overall survival (OS) was 13.7 months. One breast cancer patient had a complete response and remains on study for 37 months or more. For the 14 patients with ovarian cancer, median TTP was 2 months and median OS was 15 months. Treatment with CV-301 was well tolerated, with mild injection-site reactions representing the most common side effect.
"Approval of the first active immunotherapy for cancer by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration provided definitive proof-of-concept for this class of agents and further demonstrated that overall survival, rather than time to progression or tumor shrinkage, may be a more relevant clinical endpoint in evaluating the effects of immunotherapies," said Reiner Laus, President of the Cancer Vaccine Division. "The sustained benefit seen in some patients receiving CV-301 provides additional insight into the potential of this therapeutic vaccine and we look forward to results from an ongoing randomized Phase 2 study of CV-301 in patients with metastatic breast cancer."
CV-301 originates from the same poxvirus technology platform as PROSTVAC®, the Company's lead product candidate. While PROSTVAC® incorporates a single antigen overexpressed in prostate cancer (PSA), CV-301 incorporates two antigens (CEA and MUC-1) that are overexpressed in other major cancers, including breast, lung, and ovarian, which makes CV-301 potentially applicable in various cancers. CV-301 is currently the subject of an NCI-sponsored, randomized Phase 2 study of docetaxel (chemotherapy) alone or in combination with CV-301 in metastatic breast cancer.
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