A recent study by an expert group under a Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry panel has failed to prove a higher potency of the cancer drug Iressa over an existing cancer drug, researchers said.</PARAGRAPH> <PARAGRAPH>The group, which compared Iressa, generically known as gefitinib, in clinical trials against another cancer drug, said 'there seems to be no basis for –

to actively choose" Iressa over another type of cancer drug.

Iressa has been linked to hundreds of deaths since its July 2002 approval for sale in Japan. The screening process was unusually fast, and Japan was the first country to import the drug.

The study was conducted from September 2003 on 490 patients at 50 facilities across Japan. One group was given the chemotherapy drug Taxotere (docetaxel) and the other Iressa, which was slow to boost the survival rate but later went up, but not significantly, the researchers said.