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Two Infants Treated with Universal Immune Cells Have Their Cancer Vanish

technologyreview.com

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Re: Two Infants Treated with Universal Immune Cells Have Their Cancer Vanish

#21

Post by maxerickson »

JPLeRouzic wrote: post #16
guard-of-terra wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

However, given that cancer cells do not evolve between individuals (as opposed to bacteria and virii), if we are to find a efficient immunological treatment it's going to stay efficient. If anything, we will evolve for our cancers to respond better to it.

Somehow it is strange that cancer cells do not try to propage to other organisms, given they try hard to invade their host? Is there any known reason for that (absence of) behavior?

I imagine a big part of it is that they kill the host pretty quickly.

Re: Two Infants Treated with Universal Immune Cells Have Their Cancer Vanish

#22

Post by blisterpeanuts »

Happy babies! As a point of interest, this type of engineered T-cell treatment has its roots in research at the Weizmann Institute in Tel Aviv. They demonstrated the use of CARs modified T-cells in curing leukemic disease in rats and mice several years ago.

Their research was expanded to human trials at Univ. of Penn. where 27 of 29 patients with incurable leukemia and most of whom had a prognosis of death within a few months went into remission and showed no sign of the disease.

This modality may work with other forms of cancer; engineered T-cells that can enter every capillary in the body could potentially wipe out entire colonies of cancer cells. The potential is enormous, as are the challenges; cancers can be very difficult to differentiate from healthy tissue.

[1]http://www.timesofisrael.com/breakthrough-cancer-cure-has-de...

Re: Two Infants Treated with Universal Immune Cells Have Their Cancer Vanish

#23

Post by pmiller2 »

ryeguy_24 wrote: post #5

"The ready-made approach could pose a challenge to companies including Juno Therapeutics and Novartis, each of which has spent tens of millions of dollars pioneering treatments that require collecting a patient’s own blood cells, engineering them, and then re-infusing them." Is author serious with this statement? Two kids lives were saved with a potentially inexpensive technique and the author think's this point is r…

I hardly think a treatment costing $4000/dose to manufacture is inexpensive.

Re: Two Infants Treated with Universal Immune Cells Have Their Cancer Vanish

#24

Post by omegaworks »

L_Rahman wrote: post #19
mediocrejoker wrote: post #11

> “We estimate the cost to manufacture a dose would be about $4,000,” she says. That’s compared to a cost of around $50,000 to alter a patient’s cells and return them. > Either type of treatment is likely to cost insurers half a million dollars or more if they reach the market. Can someone more familiar with the pharmaceutical industry explain this?

I can explain the first quote. In a universal donor scenario, the T-cells are engineered, error corrected and tested once. From there, they can be multiplied pretty cheaply. Most of the cost is in the initial engineering. In a patient cell scenario, each individual patient's cells must be engineered, tested and delivered. This is obviously much more expensive. A very crude computer science analogy would be the differ…

Private insurers are too fragmented and small to negotiate a reasonable price for treatment. They lack the leverage that something like a national single-payer system would have.

Re: Two Infants Treated with Universal Immune Cells Have Their Cancer Vanish

#25

Post by muninn_ »

pmiller2 wrote: post #23
ryeguy_24 wrote: post #5

"The ready-made approach could pose a challenge to companies including Juno Therapeutics and Novartis, each of which has spent tens of millions of dollars pioneering treatments that require collecting a patient’s own blood cells, engineering them, and then re-infusing them." Is author serious with this statement? Two kids lives were saved with a potentially inexpensive technique and the author think's this point is r…

I hardly think a treatment costing $4000/dose to manufacture is inexpensive.

To cure cancer and live? Seems pretty cheap to me.

Re: Two Infants Treated with Universal Immune Cells Have Their Cancer Vanish

#26

Post by blisterpeanuts »

L_Rahman wrote: post #19
mediocrejoker wrote: post #11

> “We estimate the cost to manufacture a dose would be about $4,000,” she says. That’s compared to a cost of around $50,000 to alter a patient’s cells and return them. > Either type of treatment is likely to cost insurers half a million dollars or more if they reach the market. Can someone more familiar with the pharmaceutical industry explain this?

I can explain the first quote. In a universal donor scenario, the T-cells are engineered, error corrected and tested once. From there, they can be multiplied pretty cheaply. Most of the cost is in the initial engineering. In a patient cell scenario, each individual patient's cells must be engineered, tested and delivered. This is obviously much more expensive. A very crude computer science analogy would be the differ…

Mostly profit to pay back the investors for billions of dollars in research and development, and baked in liability insurance.

Some of it also goes to pay for the R&D of other drugs that never make it to market.

Re: Two Infants Treated with Universal Immune Cells Have Their Cancer Vanish

#27

Post by ska »

JPLeRouzic wrote: post #16
guard-of-terra wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

However, given that cancer cells do not evolve between individuals (as opposed to bacteria and virii), if we are to find a efficient immunological treatment it's going to stay efficient. If anything, we will evolve for our cancers to respond better to it.

Somehow it is strange that cancer cells do not try to propage to other organisms, given they try hard to invade their host? Is there any known reason for that (absence of) behavior?

See Retric's comment and link. Short answer is, can.

A more common transmission mechanism is itself a virus (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oncovirus) .

But, remember unlike bacteria or a virus, cancer isn't typically "invading" and you aren't "hosting". It's a malfunction of your own cells resulting in unregulated growth. For the most part it isn't really something you "get", so much as a failure mode of you as a system.

We do use the terminology "invasive" but not because it came from outside the body, rather that it is leaving one organ or tissue and entering another.

Re: Two Infants Treated with Universal Immune Cells Have Their Cancer Vanish

#28

Post by pmiller2 »

muninn_ wrote: post #25
pmiller2 wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hardly think a treatment costing $4000/dose to manufacture is inexpensive.

To cure cancer and live? Seems pretty cheap to me.

I didn't say it wouldn't be worth it, just that it's expensive. There are certainly access issues to consider here if this comes to market.

Re: Two Infants Treated with Universal Immune Cells Have Their Cancer Vanish

#29

Post by logical42 »

pmiller2 wrote: post #23
ryeguy_24 wrote: post #5

"The ready-made approach could pose a challenge to companies including Juno Therapeutics and Novartis, each of which has spent tens of millions of dollars pioneering treatments that require collecting a patient’s own blood cells, engineering them, and then re-infusing them." Is author serious with this statement? Two kids lives were saved with a potentially inexpensive technique and the author think's this point is r…

I hardly think a treatment costing $4000/dose to manufacture is inexpensive.

It seems somewhat inline with epipens being 600 dollars..

Re: Two Infants Treated with Universal Immune Cells Have Their Cancer Vanish

#30

Post by nsgi »

mediocrejoker wrote: post #11

> “We estimate the cost to manufacture a dose would be about $4,000,” she says. That’s compared to a cost of around $50,000 to alter a patient’s cells and return them. > Either type of treatment is likely to cost insurers half a million dollars or more if they reach the market. Can someone more familiar with the pharmaceutical industry explain this?

The cost of $4,000 doesn't take into account R&D costs, which must be recuperated in the drug's price.
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