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Measles Virus Puts Woman's Cancer Into Remission

Posted by Soulskill on from the fighting-fire-with-slightly-cooler-fire dept.

clm1970 sends news that researchers from Mayo Clinic have successfully put a patient's cancer into remission using a modified measles virus. The researchers are quick to note that further trials are needed to determine whether these results are repeatable. Here are the two academic papers. "Multiple myeloma in a 49-year-old woman seemed to disappear after she received an extremely high-dose injection of a measles virus engineered to kill the cancer cells. Multiple myeloma affects immune cells called plasma cells, which concentrate in the soft tissue, or marrow, inside bones. A second woman also with multiple myeloma began responding to the therapy, but her cancer eventually returned. Four other patients who received the high-dose therapy had no response. .. [Dr. Stephen Russell] and colleagues believe the two women who showed some response had few or no circulating measles antibodies, which might eliminate the engineered virus before it has a chance to kill the cancer cells. The therapy will now enter a mid-stage trial to see whether more patients with low circulating antibodies respond to high-doses of the virus, he said."

49 of 74 comments (clear)

  1. GMO!!1!! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    This has to stop before it gets out of control

  2. Oh just perfect by hsmith · · Score: 5, Funny

    How we are going to give adults autism too.

    1. Re:Oh just perfect by K.+S.+Kyosuke · · Score: 1

      Exactly! Are we sure he's doctor?

      --
      Ezekiel 23:20
    2. Re:Oh just perfect by hot+soldering+iron · · Score: 1

      Too late, I've already got Asperger Syndrome (autism-lite), so that makes me immune to the full-blown version. Right?

      --
      When you want something built, come see me. If you want correct grammar and spelling, get a F*ing liberal arts student.
  3. Damnit! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    So now the MMR vaccine causes cancer, as well as autism?

    1. Re:Damnit! by tuck182 · · Score: 2

      I don't believe that "put into remission" and "caused" are anywhere near the same thing.

    2. Re:Damnit! by Chikungunya · · Score: 1

      Measles virus is the one that apparently puts the cancer into remission. If the MMR vaccine stops the virus, then the vaccine "causes" cancer.

    3. Re: Damnit! by O('_')O_Bush · · Score: 1

      We are making fun of vaccine denialists/anti-vaxxers and you are trying to bring in rationality.

      You might want to check your vaccine history.

      --
      while(1) attack(People.Sandy);
    4. Re:Damnit! by ttucker · · Score: 1

      The Cancer will kill off the Rabies.

      I think that people who have died of rabies probably would have wished that were true. It really is not a laughing matter.

    5. Re: Damnit! by Buck+Feta · · Score: 1

      Step 1: Get cancer Step 2: Get measels Step 3: Get rabies Step 4: ??? Step 5: Profit!

      --
      I am Audience.
  4. What Could Possibly Go Wrong? by Nerrd · · Score: 1

    I just can't help asking myself, What Could Possibly Go Wrong?

    1. Re:What Could Possibly Go Wrong? by fuzzyfuzzyfungus · · Score: 5, Insightful

      The neat thing about terminal cancer patients is that the answer is "Not much that would be worse than the alternative."

      It's...very liberating.

    2. Re:What Could Possibly Go Wrong? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      The poster meant what could possibly go wrong for the rest of the population.

    3. Re:What Could Possibly Go Wrong? by Nerrd · · Score: 1

      Exactly.

    4. Re:What Could Possibly Go Wrong? by radtea · · Score: 5, Interesting

      The neat thing about terminal cancer patients is that the answer is "Not much that would be worse than the alternative."

      Conversely, this high bar makes it very difficult to improve on invasive but adequate treatments. Consider mastectomy for early-stage breast cancer: it works pretty well, and that makes it damned near impossible to test any alternative treatment that might work just as well or better, and which would certainly be less invasive.

      I worked on a cancer-therapy project once and had the clever idea of applying the technique we were using--which was aimed at something that was incurable at the time--to certain kinds of breast cancer, which was just similar enough to be an interesting candidate for the technique. I talked to a breast cancer researcher and he said, "That's a really clever idea. It sounds plausible. I can't do anything with it." And then explained the above reasoning.

      This means that we tend to focus on treatments for currently untreatable cancers, and once we have something that is semi-OK, the rate of improvement goes way down. It doesn't go to zero, by any means, but the incentives shift in a way that is both perfectly logical and kind of perverse.

      --
      Blasphemy is a human right. Blasphemophobia kills.
    5. Re:What Could Possibly Go Wrong? by fuzzyfuzzyfungus · · Score: 1

      The poster meant what could possibly go wrong for the rest of the population.

      Oh, in that case, zombieism and ideopathic super-AIDS.

    6. Re:What Could Possibly Go Wrong? by the_humeister · · Score: 2

      Conversely, this high bar makes it very difficult to improve on invasive but adequate treatments. Consider mastectomy for early-stage breast cancer: it works pretty well, and that makes it damned near impossible to test any alternative treatment that might work just as well or better, and which would certainly be less invasive.

      We already do. It's called "lumpectomy with sentinel node biopsy" for small enough tumors. No need to take off the entire breast.

      I worked on a cancer-therapy project once and had the clever idea of applying the technique we were using--which was aimed at something that was incurable at the time--to certain kinds of breast cancer, which was just similar enough to be an interesting candidate for the technique. I talked to a breast cancer researcher and he said, "That's a really clever idea. It sounds plausible. I can't do anything with it." And then explained the above reasoning.

      This means that we tend to focus on treatments for currently untreatable cancers, and once we have something that is semi-OK, the rate of improvement goes way down. It doesn't go to zero, by any means, but the incentives shift in a way that is both perfectly logical and kind of perverse.

      What technique were you doing? Surgical? Medical?

    7. Re:What Could Possibly Go Wrong? by sirlark · · Score: 2

      This means that we tend to focus on treatments for currently untreatable cancers, and once we have something that is semi-OK, the rate of improvement goes way down. It doesn't go to zero, by any means, but the incentives shift in a way that is both perfectly logical and kind of perverse.

      It's called the law of diminishing returns, and applies to nearly everything sadly

    8. Re:What Could Possibly Go Wrong? by ponos · · Score: 1

      [quote]
      The neat thing about terminal cancer patients is that the answer is "Not much that would be worse than the alternative."
      [/quote]

      Needless, excessive suffering can be worse in some ways. At some point, futile treatments only serve to maintain an illusion of hope. That illusion is, of course, important in some ways, but can come at an unreasonable price.

  5. I Am Legend? by The_Other_Kelly · · Score: 4, Funny

    I know what happens now ... Vampires, end of world, bad acting, dead dogs and lots of dodgy special effect monsters.

    And Emma Thompson. So not all bad ...

    --
    (R)ule in Hell or (S)erve in Heaven [R]?
  6. Next thing you know by future+assassin · · Score: 1

    "Hi Im Will Smith! You might know me from such shows as Fresh Prince, Bad Boys and I am Legend ...."

    --
    by TheSpoom (715771) Uncaring Linux user here. I have nothing to add to this but please continue. *munches popcorn*
    1. Re:Next thing you know by vandelais · · Score: 1

      Your analogy makes no sense.
      The vaccine is Dr. Phil and the cancer is DJ Jazzy Jeff getting thrown outta the house.

      --
      Game: Player 'Donald J Trump' now has AI skill level 'experimental'.
  7. FUD by godel_56 · · Score: 5, Informative

    Apart from all the misinformation being spread by the first half dozen anti-immunization posters, you did notice that these patients probably had otherwise incurable cancers, so any reasonable chance of a cure is worth taking.

    1. Re:FUD by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Shut up. Three new deadly strains of Measles out in the open is well worth a cure for cancer. We can treat measles and even if there's a world-wide epidemic it's only the anti-vac people who will be effected. So it's a self-correcting problem.

    2. Re:FUD by Belial6 · · Score: 1

      I'm not sure if that was sarcasm or not...

    3. Re:FUD by darkonc · · Score: 2
      Perhaps -- but right now, it looks like the treatment may work best on people who have not been vaccinated.

      In other words, the anti-vac population may have yet anotther reason to tell people not to get their vaccination.

      --
      Sometimes boldness is in fashion. Sometimes only the brave will be bold.
    4. Re:FUD by tlhIngan · · Score: 1

      Perhaps -- but right now, it looks like the treatment may work best on people who have not been vaccinated.
      In other words, the anti-vac population may have yet anotther reason to tell people not to get their vaccination.

      The irony is that it also means you can't contract measles yourself, either, since contracting measles is pretty much the same as getting the vaccine. It's just the vaccine isn't as contagious nor as deadly as the real measles virus. Or as incapacitating - you can be out and about after getting the shot, but if you have measles, you'll feel just plain awful.

      So once you've contracted measles, you'll have the measles antibody as well (the same as if you had a vaccination).

      The problem is, to not get measles, you need a 90% vaccination rate.

      So don't vaccinate and hope you don't get measles in case you get this cancer. But if you don't vaccinate and others follow you, once measles takes hold you'll get infected and your cancer treatment is less effective. Or vaccinate and your cancer treatment is less effective.

  8. Neat... by mythosaz · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Multiple myeloma is forever.

    My father's fighting multiple myeloma. He beat it into remission once with a marrow treatment, and after 5 years (which is about par for the course), it came back. Enough chemo pills to bankrupt a horse later, he's teetering on the brink of remission #2, but likely going to be taking a prophylactic/maintenance dose of chemo drugs until the next time it comes out of remission - which might be the cycle he's on for the rest of his life (which we now measure in +-5 year blocks).

    There's a certain point in the process at which a painful year of chemo treatments or inpatient marrow treatments gambling for a 5-year remission in a 70-year old becomes a losing proposition, but knowing you can possibly press the snooze button on cancer through normal methods enough times that perhaps, perhaps, just get your Super Measles! shot someday for your next 5-years snooze is promising.

    Here's hoping.

    1. Re:Neat... by Mr+D+from+63 · · Score: 1

      Its always good to think there may be another option on the table.

      Hope your dad keeps ahead of it.

    2. Re:Neat... by vux984 · · Score: 1

      . Enough chemo pills to bankrupt a horse later

      "bankrupt a horse" ? That's an odd expression.

      I am sorry to hear about your father though. Here's hoping indeed!

    3. Re:Neat... by Culture20 · · Score: 1

      That's because you've never seen a horse's check book.

    4. Re:Neat... by twosat · · Score: 1

      My mother died of multiple myeloma nearly 5 years ago. She was told that she had about 18 months to live. She died after about 3 months when it spread to one of her lungs - something rare in a rare disease. Looking back on it, I'm kind of glad that she did not have to suffer a long, drawn-out sickness and slow death.

  9. There's only one way this will end. by russotto · · Score: 4, Funny

    "...when wintertime rolls around, the gorillas simply freeze to death."

  10. Wow! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    As a junior doctor in my first year of work, this fills me with such hope and joy. This isn't just cancer, its multiple myeloma. A cancer of the cells in your bone marrow which forces a single type of immune cell to go into overdrive, pouring out malformed antibodies. It ruins kidneys and breaks down bone, Google 'pepper pot skull'. A ferocious, fearsome disease. I'll always remember being a med student and seeing a patient with a particularly bad case talking to his too young kids about how the next bone marrow transplant was going to save his life for good and thinking to myself in abject sadness "No it won't." It was the first time I realised that disease doesn't discriminate, that disease is cruel, and that it kills good people and that there's nothing I can do about that.

    Then people make things like this. When I look at the new monoclonal antibodies we're making, these virus therapies and miraculous molecules like imatinib I'm forced to wonder.. What death sentences today will be the inconveniences of tomorrow? I'm humbled by the genius of those who make these things for me to prescribe.

  11. But.. by slampman · · Score: 2

    ..Wasn't this how the new I am Legend started?

  12. Headlines! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Why can't the headline start with "ENGINEERED Measles Virus [...]". Be accurate.

    1. Re:Headlines! by RDW · · Score: 1

      Why can't the headline start with "ENGINEERED Measles Virus [...]". Be accurate.

      The engineering was incidental to the success of the treatment in these particular cases. The 'oncolytic' virus, already adapted to preferentially infect tumour cells just by growing it in tumour cell cultures, has indeed been engineered to express a protein that mediates iodine uptake into infected cells, but in the current study this was only used for tracing the infection with radioactive iodine. The tumour cells were killed by normal viral mechanisms. However, using a higher dose of radioactive iodine, they will in future also be able to target the infected cells with therapeutic levels of the radioisotope in much the same way that thyroid cancers are treated (thyroid cells naturally express the same protein).

  13. Viruses without common antibodies... by muhula · · Score: 2

    It's interesting that the treatment is hypothesized to have failed for people who already had measles antibodies. Perhaps the "extinct" viruses the CDC keeps around might be good for engineering future treatments.

  14. Re:Measles? by RDW · · Score: 2

    Why the fuck would you engineer a virus from a virus that everyone has been immunized for? Which genius thought that was a good idea? Why not use a virus that the immune system has difficulty fighting off and won't be purged? Herpes perhaps?

    (a) They selected patients for treatment who already had low levels of measles antibodies. (b) This is only one of a range of oncolytic viruses (including herpes visues) being investigated. (c) The virus could be further engineered so that antibodies to vaccine or wild type strains do not bind it. (d) Other strategies could be used to hide the virus from the immune system, including the use of 'carrier cells'.

  15. Just like Gollum at Mount Doom! by Jahoda · · Score: 1

    And here everyone thought the antivaxxers were crazy and dangerous and no good would come of their efforts!!!

  16. Straight from an MM patient: by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Here's your Myeloma 101. It is incurable. Still. The Engineered, very high level Measles Vaccine is only good for those patients who have run out of all other options- have very,very little immune system and it still not proven as anything more than a treatment--She did develop another tumor more recently. But yes, it is better than being told, " Go Home and Put your things in order". That speech is the one the hard-working Myeloma doctors hate to give and they have to much too often.

    The myeloma cell is a cancer of the plasma cell. Let me say this on how tough it is. If you chemo and irradiate your bones at high level for 7days, the only thing left is bone, plasma cells and.....the myeloma which doesn't know how to die (apoptosis) . It dissolves your bones throughout your body, flooding calcium killing your kidneys, and causes imaginable anemia. If you are lucky enough to survive that it will destroy your immune system. One friend's wife (a nurse) upon hearing that I was diagnosed with it in 2009, said " That is a most terrible way to die, you would wish to get Ebola instead". Not far off.

    I have been through radiation treatments, two (2) stem cell treatments and the type of Novel Agents that the other post mentioned about his dad.
    I wish him all the best. I gotta be a realist, but optimism springs eternal every week I go to my experimental infusion of a new antibody. The amazing hard work of the researchers and doctors coupled with an positive-thinking myeloma community keeps me going. And my wife, who has put up with more than anyone should endure.

    Be Positive!
    Mike

     

    1. Re:Straight from an MM patient: by tsa · · Score: 2

      I don't intend to sound rude so please try and take my question seriously: if the treatment is so bad and it doesn't help, isn't it better to choose not to be treated and just die of the disease? It seems to me that saves you a lot of agony.

      --

      -- Cheers!

  17. Re:Measles? by Farmer+Tim · · Score: 3, Informative

    Answers:
    1) Because if it escapes into the wild there's minimal chance of spreading with unforeseen (except possibly by Richard Matheson) consequences.
    2) Someone who undoubtedly understands contagious disease control better than you and has to answer to a safety and ethics committee, which also undoubtedly understands contagious disease control better than you.
    3) Because maybe you don't want it hanging around and moving on to other tissues after it's dealt with the target cancer...
    4) ...or being transmitted by the patient for the rest of their life.

    So a relatively harmless and not easily transmissible virus is the best choice for this experiment, even if it isn't the best choice for the individual patients involved.

    --
    Blank until /. makes another boneheaded UI decision.
  18. Horrible by tsa · · Score: 1

    My non-existing god, she must feel horrible. Normal cancer treatment isn't nice to begin with and then this virus on top of that. I wish her strength.

    --

    -- Cheers!

  19. uh oh... by viperidaenz · · Score: 1

    So getting the measles vaccination can stop you getting a cancer cure in the future... Although I suppose recovering from actually getting measles would give you the same antibodies.

  20. Re:FFS people!!! by viperidaenz · · Score: 1

    Better than something like "no patients responded, several died as a result of the treatment"

  21. How about just avoiding most cancer? by Paul+Fernhout · · Score: 1

    "Eat For Health - The Anti-Cancer Diet" https://www.drfuhrman.com/libr...

    Especially mushrooms as discussed there...

    Also look into iodine, vitamin D, and exercise (including to keep the lymph moving so it can do its job). And good sleep and various ways to relax (friends, music, laughter, nature walks, pets,etc.-- see Andrew Weil and also Blue Zones) and put the nervous system in a health-promoting state of mind as far as controlling the immune system.

    And also avoiding toxins/radiation in food and the environment (including consumer products).

    We need to learn about the role of some compounds or organisms found in moldy fruit and pond water (and mushrooms, as above, and also various herbs) that may also help the body deal with cancer. Our too clean environments may have their costs, since our bodies are adapted to live in a certain context of threats and opportunities.

    Fasting can also sometimes help prevent cancer, since the body can selectively get rid of problematical cells first. Fasting also makes chemotherapy less bad because normal cells go into a sort of resting phase during fasting whereas the cancer cells keep growing and are more exposed to the chemotherapy toxins (not that the benefits of most chemotherapy seem worth the costs from what I read -- although some treatments may be worth it).

    People are always getting cancerous cells, and most times their immune systems get rid of them. We nee do do what we can to boost the immune system (nutrition etc.) and also reduce the frequency of cells going rogue (toxins).

    That said, sure it would be good to have better treatments for when people's immune systems fail to regulate their cancer cells. As you said, it is heart breaking to watch such a progression. And as Dr. Fuhrman says, once cancer is detected as a macro scale, it is iffy to get rid of if by means known today in most cases. So yes, better magic bullets would be great. But what we can do right now is try to minimize the need for magic bullets.

    My guess as to why this measles treatment works is that cancer cells have shifted so much of their cellular pathways to replication that they are unable to defend at all against the measles virus, compared to other cells. This probably either causes them to self-destruct or tags them in some way that triggers the immune system. This effect is probably not specific to the measles virus but may well apply to any of many broad classes of virus.

    Good luck with your career. Maybe someday something like this will take off (my proposal for better software for medical sensemaking):
    https://www.newschallenge.org/...
    http://www.changemakers.com/di...
    http://slashdot.org/comments.p...

    --
    A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.
  22. See also: Coley's Cancer-Killing Concoction by Paul+Fernhout · · Score: 1

    http://soylentnews.org/comment...
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C...
    http://www.damninteresting.com...
    "Furthermore, both radiotherapy and chemotherapy have an immune-suppressing side-effect. Since both treatments kill the rapidly dividing cells of the immune system along with the rapidly dividing cancer cells, both can be used together if care is taken. But immune-stimulating Coley's Toxins work entirely differently, and their effect would be cancelled out if used at the same time as high-dose immunosuppressant chemo- or radiotherapy. It became an either/or situation-- and in the end, the fashionable new treatments won out over Coleyâ(TM)s fiddly reworking of an ancient 'natural' remedy. "

    Some other suggestions by me here (primarily nutritional, but also on fasting helping with chemotherapy):
    http://slashdot.org/comments.p...

    More on mushrooms and preventing cancer as also mentioned:
    http://articles.mercola.com/si...

    It is hard to know who to trust in the cancer industry to find, as you suggest, the best individualized treatment. It's certainly true that people selling alternative products and books (including Furhman, mentioned in my other post) have a conflict of interest. In general, the entire field of oncology is also sadly full of conflict of interest because oncologists make so much money by doing treatments.
    https://www.burtongoldberg.com...
    "Here is a shocking fact you most likely did not know: Unlike other kinds of doctors, cancer doctors (oncologists) are allowed to profit from the sale of chemotherapy drugs. In fact, most of the annual income oncologists earn comes from the profit that they make from selling these highly toxic drugs to their patients."

    And:
    http://www.kevinmd.com/blog/20...
    "And that is where oncologic decision making gets really messy. Because in the United States, at least, many oncologists make a good deal of their income selling drugs to their patients. ... Many oncologists vehemently deny being influenced by this financial conflict of interest. But such denials defy both logic and data. Oncologists would have to be superhuman not to be influenced, at least unconsciously, by such strong incentives. After all, there is often no single "best" way to treat any given tumor, and there's often good reason to believe that expensive new therapies might be better than older, cheaper treatments. In the face of such uncertainty, how could oncologists avoid being influenced by the knowledge that those promising expensive new treatments also help generate so much income?"

    Integrative alternatives:
    http://www.drweil.com/drw/u/PA...

    Regardless of the future, I wish you the best in making the most of each day like this celebrity with cancer:
    http://www.reuters.com/article...
    http://www.people.com/people/a...
    "Resolved to face her last days with courage and humor, "I don't think of dying," says the actress, 73, who previously battled lung cancer in 2009. "I think of being here now.""

    Good luck!

    --
    A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.
  23. Stand Up to Cancer: Immunotherapy by Paul+Fernhout · · Score: 1

    From a new campaign I just saw yesterday on the immune boosting theme: http://www.standup2cancer.org/...
    ---
    The battle against cancer is hard fought and hard won, and often treatments are as debilitating as the disease itself. But inside each of us is the power to fight cancer: our immune system.
    Stand Up To Cancer and the Cancer Research Institute have joined forces in one of the most promising new research areas, using the science of immunology to get our bodies' own natural defenses to fight the disease. Immunotherapy has the potential to significantly change the treatment of cancer as we know it. Stand Up with us. Together, we can impact millions of lives.
            Immunotherapy is a new class of cancer treatment that works to harness the innate powers of the immune system to fight cancer.
            From the preventive vaccine for cervical cancer to the first therapy ever proven to extend the lives of patients with metastatic melanoma, immunology has already led to major treatment breakthroughs for a number of cancers.
            Because of the immune system's unique properties, these therapies may hold greater potential than current treatment approaches to fight cancer more powerfully, to offer longer-term protection against the disease, to come with fewer side effects, and to benefit more patients with more cancer types.

    --
    A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.