G-BA: Benlysta offers additional benefit

Germany's Federal Joint Committee (G-BA) said Benlysta belimumab from GlaxoSmithKline plc (LSE:GSK; NYSE:GSK) provides a "significant" degree of additional benefit over "optimized standard therapy" in patients with autoantibody-positive systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE). G-BA disagreed with a May preliminary assessment from the Institute for Quality and Efficiency in Health Care (IQWiG), which found no additional benefit for Benlysta on the basis that trials for the drug had limited standard therapy options and therefore did not compare Benlysta against optimized standard therapy. G-BA concluded that the restrictions on treatment options did not constitute a deviation from optimized standard therapy (see BioCentury Extra, May 2). ...