Astellas Pharma Inc. announced the Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use (CHMP) of the European Medicines Agency (EMA) adopted a positive opinion recommending approval of XTANDI™ (enzalutamide) as monotherapy or in combination with androgen deprivation therapy for the treatment of adult men with high risk biochemical recurrent (BCR) non-metastatic hormone sensitive prostate cancer (nmHSPC) who are unsuitable for salvage radiotherapy.1

Ahsan Arozullah, MD, MPH, Senior Vice President and Head of Oncology Development, Astellas said "Men with nmHSPC with high-risk biochemical recurrence are very likely to experience disease progression. With approximately 9 out of 10 of these men developing metastatic disease, the need for new and effective treatment options is critical. Today's positive opinion from the Committee is an important step forward for providing an additional treatment option for these patients and complements the existing efficacy and safety data supporting the use of XTANDI across the prostate cancer disease continuum. We look forward to XTANDI being potentially the first and only androgen receptor signaling inhibitor approved for this patient population in the European Union."

The positive CHMP opinion is based on the results from the Phase 3 EMBARK trial, which were presented as a plenary session during the 2023 American Urological Association Annual Meeting and subsequently published in the New England Journal of Medicine.

The positive opinion will now be reviewed by the European Commission (EC), which has the authority to approve medicines in all 27 European Union (EU) member states as well as Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway.2  

XTANDI was approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for the treatment of patients with non-metastatic castration-sensitive prostate cancer (nmCSPC; also known as nmHSPC) with BCR at high risk for metastasis in November 2023. Astellas is also discussing the EMBARK data with other regulatory authorities to support additional license applications for XTANDI in this indication in 2024 and beyond.

Astellas has already reflected the impact from this result in its financial forecast for the current fiscal year ending March 31, 2024.