24 August 2018 - China’s State Drug Administration has approved AstraZeneca, a United Kingdom-based pharmaceuticals firm, to sell the first ovarian cancer treatment available in the world’s most populous country.

AstraZeneca, which was formed from a British-Swedish merger in 1999, applied for permission to distribute the poly ADB-ribose polymerase inhibitor named olaparib just nine months ago, it said in a statement yesterday. The drug can reduce the risk of death from ovarian cancer by 65%, according to test reports.

The drug is the first PARP inhibitor for treating recurrent ovarian cancer to get the green light in China, George Chen, president of AstraZeneca China’s new drug development department, said in the statement. It is also the first such drug to get approval from the United States FDA.

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