Enliven Therapeutics’ leukemia drug shows promise in new study

Adam Feuerstein is a senior writer and biotech columnist, reporting on the crossroads of drug development, business, Wall Street, and biotechnology. He is also a co-host of the weekly biotech podcast The Readout Loud and author of the newsletter Adam’s Biotech Scorecard. You can reach Adam on Signal at stataf.54.

A targeted drug from Enliven Therapeutics induced molecular responses in nearly half of patients with advanced leukemia, including higher response rates in patients treated at an earlier stage of their disease.

The updated early-stage study results reported Thursday for the Enliven drug, ELVN-001, compare favorably to a current blockbuster medicine sold by Novartis and an upstart experimental drug recently bought by Merck.

At 24 weeks, an 80 mg, once-daily dose of ELVN-001 achieved a major molecular response in 48% of patients with chronic myeloid leukemia, or CML, a slow-growing cancer that starts in myeloid cells.

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