Scientist managed to defeat cancer? It looks like yes. An example of this is a girl fully cured from lymphoblastic leukemia in an incredibly short term.
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Russian proverb «fight fire with fire» works sometimes in very unexpected situations. And in some cases, such a counteraction can even save life and give humanity hope to get rid of deaths in the future. Proof of this — The fact that the doctors of the oncological center at a pediatric hospital in Philadelphia (USA) committed a real breakthrough in medicine, learning to treat cancer with HIV. Scientists conducted research in the field of genetic engineering and were able to reprogram the deadly virus so that he began to serve a person for the benefit.
As doctors told, seven-year-old Emily Whitehad from New Jersey for two years fought with a terrible disease — lymphoblastic leukemia. This is the most common form of cancer in children, the peak of morbidity usually falls for three years. Prescribed by doctors irradiation sessions and chimotherapy girl did not help. It was not possible to achieve even the period of remission required for bone marrow transplantation. After the day before the girl had a recurrence, the doctors were forced to admit that the recovery of the patient was unlikely to live for no more than a few days. But the girls' parents decided to fight to the end and turned to the specialists of one of the best in the US oncological centers, which is in Philadelphia. Director of the Center Stefan Group offered her parents experimental, but today there is a high hope of treatment, which is called CTL019 therapy. At the same time, the parents warned that the girl had one chance of a thousand, and they agreed to fight for her daughter in such an unusual way.
T-cells to combat leukemia
The essence of CTL019 therapy is that scientists will modify the HIV virus. Its genetic code is changed in such a way that an infected T-cell attacks cancer tissue, while not affecting healthy. T cells are often called real «workshoes» Immune system, as they perform the hardest work, finding and attacking the hazardous cells invisible in the body. Since viruses, in this case, embedded in T cells, have phenomenal capabilities to penetrate the cell and transfer to it genetic material, and they have introduced new genes to them that help cells to deal with cancer. Healthy lymphocytes at the same time do not participate in the fight. Infected T cells recognize oncological cells due to the specific protein CD19. And yet, despite the seeming effectiveness, this treatment is still incredibly life-threatening: the infection of HIV is accompanied by the final decline and so weakened immunity, and the patient feels severe pain.
In this case, the efforts of doctors were crowned with success: after the introduction of a modified virus, the state of the small Emily improved literally in a few hours. Doctors noted that she began to breathe smaller, her temperature and pressure were normal. The head of the group conducting treatment, later she said that three weeks after the start of cell therapy, the girl had persistent remission. Doctors checked her blood and bone marrow for the presence of patient cells through three and six months after the introduction of so-called T-cells, but did not find anything. It has been established that in the body of the girl there are still cells that are struggling with cancer, as a kind of immunity against an oncological disease.
Scientists have proven: cancer can be defeated
CTL019 therapy were subjected to another 12 patients. Nine of these attempts ended positively. Two other children who participated in research, doctors also found a complete remission. However, despite the fantastic success of the first therapy infected T-cells, it is unlikely to be applied everywhere soon. One of the reasons is the high price of this treatment — 20 thousand dollars per session. Another reason is that HIV cells reduce immunity, cause severe pain and make the patient's already weakened organism at first completely defenseless before viruses. All this can lead to a fatal outcome. But nevertheless, doctors from all over the world hope that this method will develop, will become affordable and will help millions of people suffering from cancer who have lost hope. Most likely, over time, this procedure will allow to abandon bone marrow transplant operations.
