Mer­ck snags pri­or­i­ty re­view for Pre­vnar 13 ri­val — just one month af­ter Pfiz­er sent its fol­low-on to the FDA

Al­most a decade af­ter Pre­vnar 13 was ap­proved — go­ing on to be­come Pfiz­er’s best-sell­ing prod­uct — Mer­ck is one step away from hav­ing a ri­val vac­cine to of­fer.

The FDA is tuck­ing V114, the 15-va­lent pneu­mo­coc­cal con­ju­gate vac­cine, in­to its pri­or­i­ty re­view line, mean­ing we’ll know by Ju­ly whether Mer­ck can fi­nal­ly com­plete the years-long jour­ney to de­throne Pre­vnar 13.

Mer­ck’s vac­cine con­ju­gates cap­su­lar poly­sac­cha­rides from 15 serotypes of Strep­to­coc­cus pneu­mo­nia to a car­ri­er pro­tein, two more than Pfiz­er’s.

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