A CANCER therapy that harnesses the body’s natural “killer” immune cells could give hope to patients whose disease overcomes other treatments, scientists say. Professor Kristian Helin, chief executive of the Institute of Cancer Research said: “So far, we’ve only seen initial findings in a small group of patients but the results look promising and we’re optimistic this could be a new type of immunotherapy for cancers that are otherwise hard to treat.”
Called AFM24, it targets a “warhead” commonly produced by many types of cancers including lung, bowel, kidney, stomach and pancreatic.
An international study evaluated the therapy in a small trial of 24 patients. A third responded well, including two whose tumours shrunk or stopped growing for more than three months.
Professor Kristian Helin, chief executive of the Institute of Cancer Research said: “So far, we’ve only seen initial findings in a small group of patients but the results look promising and we’re optimistic this could be a new type of immunotherapy for cancers that are otherwise hard to treat.”
AFM24 is similar to the cutting edge CAR-T therapy in which the patient’s own immune cells are reprogrammed to target cancer. But while CAR-T is personalised, the new method could be cheaper and faster and work against a wider range of cancers.
This news was originally published by EXPRESS.