STAT+: FDA approves Protagonist and Takeda’s drug for rare blood cancer

The US Food and Drug Administration approved a new treatment for polycythemia vera, a rare and slow-growing cancer in which the overproduction of red blood cells thickens the blood and raises the risk of life-threatening heart attacks, strokes, and blood clots. The drug, rusfertide, was developed by biotech company Protagonist Therapeutics and will be sold by Japanese pharma Takeda under the brand name Mimrylo, administered as a weekly injection.