The first cancer-killing virus is approved by the FDA
The virus, called Imlygic, was developed, in part, in a Massachusetts lab.
A cancer-killing virus that will treat people battling advanced-stage melanoma was approved Tuesday by the Food and Drug Administration, reports Stat.
The virus, called Imlygic, was developed, in part, in a Massachusetts lab. It is a version of the herpes virus that attacks cancer cells.
“This is huge for the whole field, and for cancer patients,’’ John Bell, a senior scientist at the Ottawa Hospital Research Institute in Canada, told Stat. “The field is exploding, and this would be another arrow in the quiver that oncologists use.’’
In a trial of 436 patients with the disease, 16 percent treated with Imlygic saw their tumors shrink for at least six months, reports Stat. And for those whose cancer didn’t spread to internal organs, the response was 33 percent. Furthermore, the viral therapy produced fewer unpleasant side effects than existing treatments do.
Melanoma, a deadly form of skin cancer, kills about 10,000 people per year in the United States.
Read the full story in Stat.
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