Seattle Genetics says leukemia drug fails trial

Seattle Genetics said on Monday it would discontinue development of its experimental drug lintuzumab after a trial found it did not extend the lives of patients with acute myeloid leukemia and its shares fell 13.5 per cent. Wall Street analysts had modest expectations for lintuzumab, which was licensed by Seattle Genetics in 2005 after PDL BioPharma Inc decided not to pursue the antibody following disappointing results from leukemia trials using a lower dose of the drug. The Phase IIb study was designed to show whether lintuzumab, or SGN33, in combination with low-dose chemotherapy, improved survival for people over the age of 60 who have acute myeloid leukemia, the most common type of the blood cancer in adults, compared to chemotherapy alone. Seattle Genetics said the difference in overall survival between the treatment arms was not statistically significant, and patients in both groups lived longer than had been seen in previous studies of the chemotherapy regimen used in the trial.