Matt & Adam’s Take: Amylyx did the right thing by withdrawing its ALS drug. That’s rare and worthy of praise

On Thursday morning, Amylyx Pharmaceuticals announced that it would withdraw its ALS drug, Relyvrio, after a large clinical trial showed that the medicine, approved by the Food and Drug Administration in 2022, was not effective.

Amylyx’s co-CEOs, Joshua Cohen and Justin Klee, had previously publicly promised that they would withdraw the drug if further testing failed to show a benefit. After they made good on that promise, STAT senior writers Adam Feuerstein and Matthew Herper talked through what to make of it all.

Matt: I have to say I’m impressed. Amylyx had seemed to telegraph that it would actually follow through with withdrawing the drug when the negative data were released. But I half expected that it would still find a loophole or a way to drag things out.

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