FDA advisory panel backs Merck’s blood clot-preventing drug

Merck & Co Inc’s experimental blood clot-preventing drug vorapaxar should be approved to reduce the risk of further heart problems in people who have suffered a recent heart attack, an advisory panel to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration concluded on Wednesday. The FDA is not bound to follow the advice of its advisory panels but typically does so. Results from a trial known as TRA 2P were “robust,” panelists said, and justified approval for patients who had suffered a heart attack. “I think this drug addresses a real unmet medical need,” said Dr. Philip Sager, consulting professor of medicine at Stanford University School of Medicine.