FLEX: Erbitux Boosts Survival Five Weeks

CHICAGO -- The combination of ImClone Sytems' (IMCL Quote) cancer drug Erbitux plus chemotherapy boosts patient survival by five weeks compared to chemotherapy alone, according to results from a closely watched lung cancer study that were released a day early at the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) annual meeting Saturday.

A five-week survival benefit for Erbitux from the so-called FLEX study straddles most investor expectations, which were generally in the four-to-six week range.

The Erbitux survival boost, however, came close to missing the threshold for statistical significance -- an indication that while positive overall, suggests some data from the FLEX study are not as strong as they could be. ...