Bevacizumab Approved for Metastatic Renal Cell Carcinoma

Genentech announced that the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved bevacizumab (Avastin) plus interferon-alfa for people with metastatic renal cell carcinoma, the most common type of kidney cancer. Kidney cancer is the eighth most commonly diagnosed cancer in the United States. In 2009, 13,000 Americans will die from the disease.

“During the last 5 years, Avastin has been approved by the FDA to treat five different types of cancer,” said Hal Barron, MD, executive vice president, Global Development and chief medical officer, Genentech. “We aim to help more people facing difficult-to-treat cancers and will continue studying Avastin in more than 30 other tumor types.”