WorthyNews: FDA approves revolutionary cancer gene therapy

[WorthyNewsBot]

(Worthy News) - U.S. regulators approved on Wednesday a new therapy for a type of lymphoma, which was developed by Gilead Science Inc’s Kite Pharma, marking the second approval for this potentially revolutionary approach to fighting cancer.

The Food and Drug Administration approved the gene therapy, to be sold under the name Yescarta, to treat adults with large B-cell lymphoma, a type of non-Hodgkin lymphoma, who have failed to respond to other treatments.

The treatments are made from a patient’s own infection-fighting cells. They are extracted, genetically engineered to recognize cancer cells, and infused back into the patient, where they form an army to attack and destroy malignant cells, potentially for years. [ Source: Reuters (Read More...) ]

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[Guest Butero]

That is a really good approach to take.  It makes sense to find a way to let the body's immune system recognize cancer cells like they recognize a virus or illness so they will attack and destroy them.  It has always made more sense to me than settling for chemotherapy, though that has been effective in saving lives.  Instead of depressing the immune system, show it the threat.  I have even wondered if you could infect cancer cells with a virus on purpose.  When the immune system attacks the virus, wouldn't it stand to reason it would be harming the cancer cells too?  

I was watching an episode of "House" where a woman with cancer had the tumor shrink after she was infected with herpes.  While there is no connection between the two things, the virus caused the immune system to attack the cancer.  After watching that program, I was reading an article about a time where the approach to cancer was working with the immune system, but when chemo was developed, they pretty much abandoned doing that.  It is always good to see advances in research when it comes to cancer.  I hope it works and they continue the fight till they find a cure for all forms of cancer.