Consumer Advocacy Group Attacks FDA for Slow Approval of Cancer Treatment

May 14, 1992—(Washington, DC) The Competitive Enterprise Institute today charged that FDA’s delay in approving Interleukin-2 may have cost as many as 3500 lives.  IL-2 was finally approved last week as the only known therapy for metastic renal cell carcinoma, a fatal form of kidney cancer.  Its application had been on file with the agency for three and a half years, since November 1988.  During that time, it was approved in France, Demark, and seven other European countries.