Il Guardian riporta e commenta l’articolo publicato su Nature in cui vengono illustrati i risultati a dieci anni di distanza del trattamento CAR-T (chimeric antigen receptor – T-cell) sui primi pazienti sui quali è stato sperimentato.

CAR – chimeric antigen receptor – T-cell therapy works by genetically engineering an individual’s T-cells to recognise and destroy cancer cells.

T-cells are a type of white blood cell that can recognise and destroy foreign cells, including cancer cells, but because cancer is very good at evading immune detection, they often miss their mark. CAR T-cells are engineered to make them better at detecting cancer cells.

I pazienti, trattati per leucemie e malattie linfoproliferative croniche, sono vivi e stanno bene, e presentano ancora nel sangue le cellule infuse 10 anni fa.

Prof David Porter, of the University of Pennsylvania, who was involved in the research, said the team had been unprepared for how successful it would be. “Cancer doctors don’t use words like ‘cure’ lightly or, frankly, very often. But we now have patients like Doug who haven’t relapsed, and we really believe that we can start to use the word ‘cure’.”

La terapia può essere per ora praticata solo a persone che non abbiano tumori solidi.

In the UK the therapy is approved for use in children and young adults with B-cell acute lymphoblastic leukaemia (ALL) and adults with certain types of lymphoma – both are blood cancers.