Glioblastoma Patient Is First to Be Given Right to Try Experimental Drug in California

The Right to Try Act, signed into law by President Donald Trump last spring, may be seeing its first fruits. A California brain cancer patient who did not qualify for participation in a clinical trial will get the chance to see if an experimental glioblastoma treatment will save his life. ERC-USA, a subsidiary of Belgium-based Epitopoietic Research Corporation, has agreed to provide the patient access to ERC-1671 (Gliovac), which is currently in Phase II studies in the United States. Gliovac is already approved in Europe for patients suffering from a grade IV glioma (glioblastoma multiforme and gliosarcoma) when all other traditional treatments have failed. Treatment with ERC-1671 was initiated in late November 2018, the company said. In a brief statement, ERC-USA said the patient appealed to the company under a 2017 California Right to Try Law, so it is unclear at this time if the federal law signed in May 2018 provided any additional weight to the company’s decision to allow the patient access to the medication. The law provides patients the right to seek access to experimental drugs that have yet to be approved if those drugs have been deemed safe through early studies. The decision to allow patients access is up to the developing companies.