Two federal agencies are partnering with pharmaceutical companies and non-profit organizations to form a consortium aimed at boosting the development of gene therapies for rare diseases.   In a Wednesday announcement, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the National Institutes of Health (NIH) revealed the launch of the Bespoke Gene Therapy Consortium (BGTC). The consortium’s work will be managed by the Foundation for the NIH and sit within the NIH Acceleratin...

  A new draft guidance from the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) gives cell and gene therapy developers a detailed framework for the conduct of umbrella trials, offering the potential for enhanced speed and efficiency in early-stage clinical trials.   In the umbrella trials envisioned under the draft guidance, two or more versions of a cellular or gene therapy product would be studied for one specific disease using just one trial design, shared infrastructure, a...

When developing a regulatory submission for a gene or cellular therapy, it’s essential to keep the basics in mind, such as how to demonstrate the product’s identity, purity, and potency, Haroon Hashmi, PhD, told attendees at RAPS Convergence 2021.   “Even when we think about these complex technologies -- new emerging technologies -- certain regulatory principles always stay in place,” said Hashmi, senior vice president at Ziopharm Oncology, which has developed the Slee...

A new public-private collaborative among the United States Pharmacopeia (USP), the US Department of Commerce’s National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and the National Institute for Innovation in Manufacturing Biopharmaceuticals (NIIMBL) pools the expertise or the organizations to develop better measurement tools to assess the quality of adeno-associated virus (AAV), an increasingly important vector for gene therapy delivery.   According to a 27 June ann...

The European Medicines Agency (EMA) has weighed in on several rare adverse events for COVID-19 vaccines and one gene therapy for treating thalassemia in their latest Pharmacovigilance Risk Assessment Committee (PRAC) meeting.   At its July meeting, EMA’s Pharmacovigilance Risk Assessment Committee (PRAC) found mRNA-based COVID-19 vaccines, like Pfizer’s Comirnaty and the Moderna vaccine marketed in the EU as Spikevax, carry a small risk of myocarditis and pericarditis....

The European Medicines Agency (EMA) on Thursday opened a public consultation on the International Council for Harmonisation’s (ICH) S12 guideline on nonclinical biodistribution (BD) considerations for gene therapies.   The S12 guideline recently reached Step 2b of the ICH process after being endorsed at the ICH Assembly virtual meeting earlier this month. (RELATED: ICH reports ‘significant milestones’ reached on guidelines ranging from impurity testing to eCTD standa...

Welcome to Regulatory Reconnaissance, your daily regulatory news and intelligence briefing.   In Focus: US Moderna says that its vaccine is effective for 12- to 17-year-olds and that it will seek F.D.A. authorization ( NYT ) ( NPR ) President Biden still hasn’t appointed a permanent FDA commissioner. That has big implications for upcoming drug approvals ( Fortune ) Bipartisan Legislation Introduced to Advance Biomedical Research Stalled by Pandemic ( Global Genes ) ...

The European Medicines Agency (EMA) issued a favorable opinion for bluebird bio’s Skysona (elivaldogene autotemcel), a gene therapy that treats early cerebral adrenoleukodystrophy (CALD). Seven other medicines also received positive recommendations from the agency’s Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use (CHMP) during its May meeting.   Skysona’s status as an advanced therapy medicinal product (ATMP) means it was first assessed by EMA’s Committee for Advanced T...

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is not amenable to changing study endpoints or sample sizes for gene therapy clinical trials but is encouraging sponsors to fill in gaps in data collection with telemedicine and remote visits.   Wilson Bryan, director of the FDA’s Office of Tissues and Advanced Therapies (OTAT) in FDA’s Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research, told a 12 May meeting of the American Society of Gene and Cell Therapy that the pandemic is promp...

The European Medicines Agency (EMA) was notified by a gene therapy firm that the company has suspended marketing of its beta thalassemia treatment Zynteglo (betibeglogene autotemcel, bluebird bio) as a precautionary measure.   In a press release , the agency related that bluebird bio’s actions came after a recipient of the related bb1111 gene therapy for sickle cell disease developed acute myeloid leukemia (AML). Another bb1111 recipient has also developed myelodyspla...

Manufacturers of cell and gene therapies have a new guidance from the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) that provides pandemic-related manufacturing considerations.   The guidance specifically addresses both licensed and investigational cell and gene therapy (CGT) manufacture, and “is intended to supplement the recommendations to drug and biological product manufacturers provided in FDA’s ‘Good Manufacturing Practice Considerations for Responding to COVID-19 Infect...

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has issued draft guidance on the development, testing, and trial design for human gene therapies for neurodegenerative diseases. The document, released on 5 January 2021, also highlights approval pathways for these novel products.   The draft guidance, which applies to products for both adult and pediatric populations, emphasizes the importance of early communication with FDA before the submission of an investigational new drug...