De­spite $5B sales for Keytru­da, Mer­ck hits two PhI­II snags as it con­tin­ues to build its multi­bil­lion-dol­lar drug

Con­tin­u­ing on its quest to grow Keytru­da’s block­buster sta­tus ahead of a 2028 patent cliff, Mer­ck re­port­ed to­day that Keytru­da has missed in two in­di­ca­tions — as a first-line ther­a­py in com­bi­na­tion with Ei­sai’s Lenvi­ma for liv­er can­cer, and al­so as a lat­er-line treat­ment for metasta­t­ic prostate can­cer.

In the first case, when Mer­ck and Ei­sai com­pared Keytru­da plus Lenvi­ma to Lenvi­ma alone for liv­er can­cer that can’t be re­moved by surgery, the com­bo ther­a­py didn’t sig­nif­i­cant­ly change ei­ther over­all sur­vival or pro­gres­sion-free sur­vival.

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