Researchers Find Treatment That Kills Every Kind Of Cancer Tumor

[Flashermac]

Researchers might have found the Holy Grail in the war against cancer, a miracle drug that has killed every kind of cancer tumor it has come in contact with.

 

The drug works by blocking a protein called CD47 that is essentially a "do not eat" signal to the body's immune system, according to Science Magazine.

 

This protein is produced in healthy blood cells but researchers at Stanford University found that cancer cells produced an inordinate amount of the protein thus tricking the immune system into not destroying the harmful cells.

 

With this observation in mind, the researchers built an antibody that blocked cancer's CD47 so that the body's immune system attacked the dangerous cells.

 

So far, researchers have used the antibody in mice with human breast, ovary, colon, bladder, brain, liver and prostate tumors transplanted into them. In each of the cases the antibody forced the mice's immune system to kill the cancer cells.

 

"We showed that even after the tumor has taken hold, the antibody can either cure the tumor or slow its growth and prevent metastasis," said biologist Irving Weissman of the Stanford University School of Medicine in Palo Alto, California.

 

One side effect of the treatment was that healthy cells were subjected to short-term attacks by the mice's immune system, but the effect was nothing in comparison to the damage done to the cancer cells.

 

Weissman's group recently received a $20 million dollar grant to move their research from mouse to human safety testing.

 

 

http://www.nypost.com/p/news/international/every_cancer_kills_tumor_them_kind_L9lppJmy9gCoS848cSzqbP

[Central Scrutinizer]

Wonderful news. Hope they can perfect it to work only against the cancer cells (or at least to a safe degree for healthy cells) and for use in humans.

 

There was also a report recently on the use of low dose aspirin to help fight cancer.

[Specialist]

The human trials on this one are going to be interesting.

 

The real question is how much damage will be done to healthy cells. CD47 apparently is there to protect them from the immune system.

 

Now, if they can differentiate between CD47 from a healthy cell and CD47 from a tumor, and only block the latter, they've got a real breakthrough.

 

If this turns out to be hard on people, but more effective and less hard on them than chemotherapy, it is still a breakthrough.

[pasathai1]

Lets hope the drug companies do not buy the rights to produce it and either suppress it or charge a fortune to those that need it.

[cavanami]

There have been treatments around for many years, but they have been ignored and suppressed!

 

During WWII, the Germans were within a hair of curing cancer...where has that research gone???

 

Big Pharma is looking at $$$$, your health is waaaaaaaaaaaaaaay down on the list, IMO!!!

[TroyinEwa/Perv]

Be careful now, Cav. You know who will be along shortly to say differently.

[TheCorinthian]

The human trials on this one are going to be interesting.

 

The real question is how much damage will be done to healthy cells. CD47 apparently is there to protect them from the immune system.

 

Now, if they can differentiate between CD47 from a healthy cell and CD47 from a tumor, and only block the latter, they've got a real breakthrough.

 

If this turns out to be hard on people, but more effective and less hard on them than chemotherapy, it is still a breakthrough.

 

That's pretty much the Nobel Prize winning question.

[Boo Radley]

Interesting story and I hope it bears fruit.

Since as long as I can remember, there have been stories in the press of a miracle new cancer drug that was in testing and was going to revolutionize cancer treatment.

However, despite their initial promise, these new drugs all never made it to market for some reason or other.

[TheCorinthian]

Interesting story and I hope it bears fruit.

Since as long as I can remember, there have been stories in the press of a miracle new cancer drug that was in testing and was going to revolutionize cancer treatment.

However, despite their initial promise, these new drugs all never made it to market for some reason or other.

 

As was mentioned above, the most common problem is there is literally 100s if not 1000s of different types of cells that are "cancer." We have some very effective treatments if caught early which is more about the tumor, cells, ect., being small or few in number. But in advanced stage issues the problem is the treatments are also poisonous to every other cell, so the treatment gets to a point where the effective dose kills healthy cells too.

 

(The fun fact learned is, cancer cells are practically immortal. We had a tumor in a nutrient bath at Ft Dietrich that was over 80 years old and going strong. All sorts of theories on that one.)

 

This is the issue when dealing with new advances as they tend to be more of the same.