Novartis's Kymriah wins EU approval for blood cancer treatment

ZURICH: Swiss drugmaker Novartis received European Commission approval for Kymriah, its CAR-T cell therapy, to treat children with a form of leukemia and adults with lymphoma.

The medicine has also received approval in the United States in both indications.

The drugmaker will continue to build out facilities to manufacture Kymriah, which costs up to $475,000 for children and young adults with B-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia and $373,000 for adults with B-cell lymphoma in the United States, Novartis said.

Novartis, whose medicine competes with Gilead Sciences' Yescarta for lymphoma, did not give details about its pricing in Europe.

(Reporting by John Miller, Editing by Sherry Jacob-Phillips)