Dueling Glaxo, Astra Drugs Show Wider Benefits in Ovarian Cancer

Britain’s two largest drugmakers, betting on a new generation of cancer treatments that block tumor cells from fixing their damaged DNA, showed that these medicines work in a broad swath of patients.

Women with ovarian cancer treated with GlaxoSmithKline Plc’s drug Zejula had a 38% reduction in the risk of dying or seeing the disease progress, the company said on Saturday at a cancer conference in Barcelona. Glaxo said the study raises the possibility its therapy can work in other types of tumors. Research from AstraZeneca Plc and Merck & Co. showed their rival medicine, Lynparza, reduced the same risk by 41%.