Cancer trials have a diversity problem

Takeda’s Ninlaro is approved to treat multiple myeloma, a form of blood cancer that African-Americans are twice as likely to get as white Americans. And yet in the clinical trial that led to Ninlaro’s approval, just 1.8 percent of patients were black.

As ProPublica reports, that disparity is hardly unusual. African Americans are starkly under-represented in cancer trials, even when the disease in question disproportionately affects them. The problem stems from the failure of most drug companies to change things voluntarily and the FDA’s reluctance to force their hands.

“When it comes to clinical research in this country, there’s a credit card, and there’s a limit on the credit card,” said Dr. Rachel Sherman, the FDA’s principal deputy commissioner. “If we spend on one thing, it won’t get spent on another. We have to be judicious in what we require and what we demand and what we encourage.”

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