Analysis: A combination therapy – helping the bodys own defences fight cancer cells – has shown impressive results for terminally ill melanoma patientsImmunotherapy is the most exciting development in cancer treatment in years,beginning to seize off at a time when much cancer drug research seems to be hitting a brick wall. More and more of the orthodox chemotherapy drugs have very small effects, buying people with the advanced disease a few months or even just weeks of life, and as the Guardian reported on Saturday.
But the scientists working on immunotherapy have set out in an entirely different direction,tricking the body’s own defences into fighting the enemy cancer within. For a long time, this has been an aspiration. The concept dates back to the 1970s and for decades the grand pharmaceutical companies showed minute interest. Other drugs looked like much more certain money-earners. But now there is real evidence that immunotherapy can sometimes halt terminal cancers in their tracks and grand pharma is joining the bandwagon with a vengeance.
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Source: theguardian.com