Canada often takes years longer than U.S. to approve cancer drugs: study

Health authorities in Canada tend to take several months longer to approve new cancer drugs than those in the U.S., leaving Canadian patients waiting longer for the potentially life-extending medication, a new study suggests. Toronto-based cancer researchers Dr. Sunil Verma, from Sunnybrook’s Odette Cancer Centre in Toronto, and PhD student Nardin Samuel looked at how long it took for 41 cancer drugs to be approved in Canada, and compared the approval times to those in the U.S. and the European Union. They found that on average, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved drugs six months earlier than for the European Union's European Medicines Agency, and 7.6 months earlier than Health Canada. Read more here.