Agency wants to ensure patients ‘aren’t unnecessarily or unfairly scared off or intimidated’ from taking biosimilars, Office of Therapeutic Biologics and Biosimilars' acting policy director Eva Temkin tells the FDA/CMS Summit; Temkin says recent guidance on biosimilar insulins shows agency is trying to be flexible on interchangeability data requirements.

AstraZeneca and Merck seek to add a pancreatic cancer indication for olaparib, while Merck has hopes of broadening pembrolizumab’s use in bladder cancer; two-day Oncologic Drugs Advisory Committee meeting also will include reviews of Celgene’s luspatercept in myelodysplastic syndromes-related anemia and Epizyme’s tazemetostat for epithelioid sarcoma.

Clinicians and sponsors want the US FDA to open up antibacterial labeling to include more data on efficacy against resistant pathogens and in other body sites, but regulatory restrictions may require a workaround in the form of rapid, peer-to-peer communications about the data on new products.