NICE recommends NHS use of mirikizumab for Crohn’s disease
Ella Day | July 11, 2025 | News story | Medical Communications, Research and Development | Crohn’s disease, Gastrointestinal tract, Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency, NHS, National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE), bowel disease, clinical trial
Eli Lilly (Lilly) has announced that the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) has recommended mirikizumab (omvoh) for use on the NHS in England and Wales to treat moderately to severely active Crohn’s disease. This provides patients who responded inadequately to other therapies a new treatment option.
Specifically, the therapy is recommended for patients who responded insufficiently to, or failed to tolerate, previous biological treatment or found tumour necrosis factor alpha inhibitors are unsuitable.
The approval follows the marketing authorisation for mirikizumab in the UK by the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency less than three months ago. It also builds on the positive results of the phase 3 VIVID1 study investigating the candidate. In particular, 45% of patients treated with mirikizumab achieved clinical remission at one year versus 20% on placebo. Also, 33% of mirikizumab patients achieved early improvement in endoscopic response, defined by visible healing of the intestinal lining, versus 13% on placebo at three months.
Crohn’s disease is a chronic, inflammatory bowel disease characterised by progressive bowel damage. A significant proportion of patients face inadequate treatment outcomes, emphasising the urgent medical need for a new, alternative therapeutic.
“People living with Crohn’s disease have shared with us how truly disruptive symptoms can be,” said James Neville, associate vice president of specialty care, Lilly UK and Ireland. “Patients will [now] have access to a treatment option that may provide long-term disease control and address key symptoms.”
Ella Day
11/7/25
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