As­traZeneca’s PhI­II bid on asth­ma drug tralok­inum­ab flops, and that’s no sur­prise

Maybe the best way to look at As­traZeneca R&D now is by di­vid­ing the re­search group in­to two big buck­ets: can­cer and every­thing else. That “every­thing else” group was just hit with a wide­ly ex­pect­ed Phase III fail­ure that the drug gi­ant can ill af­ford as it strug­gles to make a con­vinc­ing case for a des­per­ate­ly need­ed turn­around.

This time the late-stage fail­ure be­longs, once again, to its IL-13 asth­ma drug tralok­inum­ab. In its first of two Phase III stud­ies, the drug failed to sig­nif­i­cant­ly re­duce an­nu­al ex­ac­er­ba­tion rates. There is a sec­ond Phase III un­der­way that As­traZeneca be­lieves could hold the key to ul­ti­mate suc­cess, say­ing that they will com­bine da­ta from the two in de­ter­min­ing its fu­ture.

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