Merck's biggest moneymaker, Keytruda, scored two important victories in women's cancer, according to presentations Sunday at the European Society for Medical Oncology.
Merck stock rose 2.1% to 117.48 in midday trades Monday. Shares have fallen by double digits, however, after hitting a 2024 high in late June.
The pharma behemoth tested cancer drug Keytruda plus chemotherapy in patients with early-stage triple negative breast cancer. After five years, 87% of Keytruda recipients were still alive vs. 82% of patients who received chemotherapy and a placebo. In another study, 83% of patients with locally advanced cervical cancer were still alive after three years, compared with 75% of chemo recipients.
Eliav Barr, who heads up Merck Research Laboratories, says the studies answer an important question for cancer patients.
"It just highlights the importance of overall survival data as being critical for improving outcomes in patients," he told Investor's Business Daily. "You wanted to know, 'Will it make me live longer?' And, the answer is, in these two cases, yes."
Merck Focus On Women's Cancers
The annual ESMO conference — like its sister meeting, the American Society of Medical Oncology, usually held in May and/or June — is a yearly who's who of cancer treatment. This ESMO, says Barr, really underscores Merck's efforts to tackle cancers that affect women.
Triple negative breast cancer is one of the deadliest breast cancers. The cancer cells don't contain estrogen and progesterone receptors nor the HER2 protein. This makes finding a target on them particularly difficult.
In the study Merck called Keynote-522, patients received the Keytruda/chemo combination before their tumors were surgically removed. After five years, patients who received Keytruda were 34% less likely to die than their counterparts in the placebo group.
"This is a really important milestone for treatment of triple negative breast cancer," Barr said in an interview. "It led to placing this regimen very high on the recommendations list around the world and certainly a lot of use in the U.S."
The same combination also reduced the risk of death by 33% over three years in the cervical cancer study. These patients had locally advanced — but not metastatic — cancer. Patients received chemo and radiation plus either Keytruda or a placebo.
Melanoma Study Shows Keytruda Dominance
The results add onto years of data that have cemented Keytruda and chemotherapy as the standard of care in numerous cancers. Keytruda is a powerhouse immuno-oncology drug, helping uncover cancer cells camouflaging themselves behind a protein called PD-1.
In another study, also presented Sunday, 34% of patients with advanced melanoma were still alive 10 years after Keytruda treatment, compared with 23.6% of patients who received Bristol Myers Squibb's Yervoy. Then, Yervoy was the standard treatment for melanoma.
Merck ran its study in a particularly sick group of patients. These patients had late-stage melanoma that couldn't be surgically removed and had worsened while undergoing at least one prior treatment with a different drug. Patients received four cycles of Keytruda or Yervoy. Some patients later received a second round of Keytruda.
The results speak to the incredible durability of Keytruda, Barr said.
"Some patients who relapsed were able to get second courses and then return to a state of disease control," he said. "And that's an impressive overall survival rate and a long-term benefit for patients."
Keytruda is easily Merck's biggest drug. It brought in just north of $25 billion in sales last year, up more than 19%. That accounted for almost 42% of total sales. This year, analysts polled by FactSet expect the Merck drug to generate $28.86 billion in sales, up above 15%. Sales are expected to grow until 2028 when the first patent protecting Keytruda expires.
Merck Advances ADCs With Kelun
But Barr notes Merck isn't resting on its laurels.
Continuing with the women's health theme for this year's ESMO, Merck also unveiled results for a drug it's developing with China's Kelun Biotech. Merck and Kelun inched a deal in late 2022 to codevelop seven antibody drug conjugates, or ADCs.
ADCs are, simply put, more targeted forms of chemotherapy.
Merck tested the drug sacituzumab tirumotecan in patients with advanced endometrial or ovarian cancer.
In endometrial cancer, 34.1% of patients responded to treatment. At the median, they lived for 5.7 months before their cancer worsened. Among ovarian cancer patients, 40% responded to treatment and they lived for six months before cancer progression.
Another test examined sacituzumab tirumotecan plus Keytruda in patients with recurrent or metastatic cervical cancer. Overall, roughly 58% of patients responded to treatment.
Follow Allison Gatlin on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, at @IBD_AGatlin.
