STAT's newsletter reports that AbbVie has won FDA approval for a pill to treat Parkinson's disease. The approval adds a new oral option for patients, though the newsletter provides no further details about the drug.
In other biotech news, Kodiak Sciences said its experimental treatment Zenkuda achieved statistical equivalence to Eylea, a standard therapy, in a Phase 3 trial for a common cause of age-related blindness. Merck also announced it paid $400 million upfront to China's SciBrunch Therapeutics for global rights to a preclinical cancer drug targeting KRAS G12D mutations, a deal that could reach $2.13 billion with milestones.
The newsletter also noted that Novo Nordisk is increasingly marketing its GLP-1 drugs as consumer products for weight loss rather than as treatments for chronic disease, a shift driven by limited insurance coverage for obesity medicines.