AstraZeneca has signed up Swiss and Dutch rivals to create blood tests to help identify patients that will benefit from its lung cancer drugs.
The pharmaceutical group, which recently fought off a £70 billion bid from US competitor Pfizer, has asked Roche Pharmaceuticals and Qiagen to create two separate diagnostic tests that will remove the need for time-consuming biopsies or surgery.
At present, lung cancer patients must have a sample of tissue collected through a needle biopsy process or surgery to test if their tumours contain the specific kind of mutation which AstraZeneca’s drugs can treat.
Finding a new way of screening patients more quickly would make it easier for treatment to begin and also make it easier for AstraZeneca to carry our larger trials