Bernardo Haddock Lobo Goulart, Vice President of Technical, Regulatory Consulting/SME Oncology at Parexel, shared a post on LinkedIn:
“Reflections about drug development and cancer control in 2025.
As the year draws to a close, we have reasons to rejoice in the robust innovations and novel treatment options made available to persons with cancer.
- FDA approved 47 new drugs or indications for cancer just in 2025.
- Of these approvals, 22 are for NMEs.
Mortality from diseases like lung cancer has declined in part due to access to such new treatments. This is no small feat, but is that enough?
The data suggest that we could save many more lives through cancer prevention and early detection:
A model-based study estimated that 4.75 of 5.94 (80%) million deaths from lung, breast, colorectal, and prostate cancer were averted by prevention and screening interventions between 1975-2020. The remainder 20% deaths averted were due to cancer treatments.
In the most optimistic estimates, global investments in cancer prevention and early detection in 2025 were US$2 to S$23.8 billion, respectively. By contrast, global investment in cancer therapeutics is estimated at US$214.3 to US$356.2 billion, or 9- to 15-fold as much as investments in early detection.
If we trust the data and our societal goal is to reduce deaths from cancer, we should continue to invest in drug development, while substantially increasing investments in evidence-based interventions for cancer prevention and early detection.
Realistically, such a change in global strategy is only conceivable with public-private partnerships. Can stakeholders conceive financial incentives for companies to invest in novel interventions for cancer prevention and early detection? Will the public sector be perpetually in charge of long-term investments in prevention, and perpetually underfunding it?
Looking at 2026 and beyond, we could reset our views on global cancer control towards prevention and early detection. The burgeoning field of multicancer early detection is already a demonstration that the private sector, too, can be a game changer.
Let’s think outside the (pill) box!”
Title: Estimation of Cancer Deaths Averted From Prevention, Screening, and Treatment Efforts, 1975-2020
Authors: Katrina A. B. Goddard, Eric J. Feuer, Jeanne S. Mandelblatt, Rafael Meza, Theodore R. Holford, Jihyoun Jeon, Iris Lansdorp-Vogelaar, Roman Gulati, Natasha K. Stout, Nadia Howlader, Amy B. Knudsen, Daniel Miller, Jennifer L. Caswell-Jin, Clyde B. Schechter, Ruth Etzioni, Amy Trentham-Dietz, Allison W. Kurian, Sylvia K. Plevritis, John M. Hampton, Sarah Stein, Liyang P. Sun, Asad Umar, and Philip E. Castle
You can read the Full Article in JAMA Oncology.
Title: The impact of multicancer early detection tests on cancer stage shift: A 10-year microsimulation model
Authors: Jagpreet Chhatwal, Jade Xiao, Andrew K. ElHabr, Christopher Tyson, Xiting Cao, Sana Raoof, A. Mark Fendrick, A. Burak Ozbay, Paul Limburg, Tomasz M. Beer, Andrew Briggs, and Ashish A. Deshmukh.
You can read the Full Article in Cancer.
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