Biogen Inc. announced that the Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use, part of the European Medicines Agency, issued a positive opinion and has recommended granting marketing authorization for VUMERITY (diroximel fumarate) in the European Union. VUMERITY is a next-generation oral fumarate for the treatment of adults with relapsing-remitting multiple sclerosis. An estimated 2.8 million people live with MS across the globe, with some European countries demonstrating the highest prevalence of MS in the world. The CHMP’s positive opinion will now be referred to the European Commission, which grants marketing authorizations for medicines in Europe. The positive CHMP opinion was based on data from pharmacokinetic bridging studies comparing VUMERITY and TECFIDERA to establish bioequivalent exposure of monomethyl fumarate, the active metabolite, and relied in part on the well-established long-term safety and efficacy profile of TECFIDERA. The CHMP also assessed findings from EVOLVE-MS-2, a large, randomized, double-blind, five-week, multi-center Phase 3 study to evaluate the gastrointestinal tolerability of VUMERITY compared to TECFIDERA in patients with RRMS. In EVOLVE-MS-2, the rate of overall treatment discontinuation was lower in participants treated with VUMERITY compared to those treated with TECFIDERA. The difference in the discontinuation rates due to GI tolerability was 0.8% for VUMERITY compared to 4.8% for TECFIDERA. VUMERITY was first approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in October 2019 and is currently the number one prescribed oral MS therapy in the country. Since its launch in the U.S., real-world data have reinforced the positive GI tolerability profile of VUMERITY and confirmed that the experience demonstrated in clinical trials is consistent with clinical practice. Biogen continues to file regulatory submissions in other countries. VUMERITY is an oral fumarate with a distinct chemical structure from TECFIDERA, approved in the U.S. for the treatment of relapsing forms of multiple sclerosis in adults, to include clinically isolated syndrome, relapsing-remitting disease and active secondary progressive disease. Once in the body, VUMERITY rapidly converts to monomethyl fumarate, the same active metabolite of dimethyl fumarate providing similar efficacy and safety profiles. VUMERITY is contraindicated in patients with known hypersensitivity to diroximel fumarate, dimethyl fumarate or to any of the excipients of VUMERITY; and inatients taking dimethyl fumarate. Serious side effects for VUMERITY are based on data from dimethyl fumarate and include anaphylaxis and angioedema, progressive multifocal leukoencephalopathy, which is a rare opportunistic viral infection of the brain that has been associated with death or severe disability, a decrease in mean lymphocyte counts during the first year of treatment, herpes zoster and other serious infections, liver injury and flushing. The most common adverse events, obtained using data from dimethyl fumarate, were flushing, abdominal pain, diarrhea and nausea. TECFIDERA, a treatment for relapsing forms of multiple sclerosis in adults, is the most prescribed oral medication for relapsing MS in the world and has been shown to reduce the rate of MS relapses, slow the progression of disability and impact the number of MS brain lesions, while demonstrating a well-characterized safety profile in people with relapsing forms of MS. TECFIDERA is approved in 69 countries, and more than 500,000 patients have been treated with it, representing more than 1,000,000 patient-years of exposure across clinical trial use and patients prescribed TECFIDERA. Of these, 6,335 patients were from clinical trials.