Another $ 50 billion to pharmaceutical corporations from Nobel laureates

2024 Author: Seth Attwood | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 15:55

The other day, the American James Ellison and the Japanese Tasuku Honjo were announced the laureates of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine. By studying the possibilities of immunity in the fight against cancer, scientists were not only able to change the approach to treatment, but also created the prerequisites for the APPEARANCE OF A MULTI-BILLION MARKET OF NEW DRUGS.

Their sales in the world this year are estimated at $ 15 billion, forecasts for the future - a market of $ 50 billion. The video of the Kramol portal dedicated to the fight against cancer and the Nobel Prize can be found at these links:

Oncology is a thriving business

What is the Nobel Prize for?

Scientist explains why immunotherapy cures cancer

The fact that tumors are able to escape immune "surveillance", continuing to live and multiply in the patient's body, despite the presence of potential targets for an immune attack (tumor antigens), has been known for a long time. Scientists assumed that tumors somehow manage to deceive the immune system, which perfectly destroys external aggressors (bacteria, viruses, foreign tissues), but does not notice the growing tumor. But the mechanism of this camouflage until recently remained unknown for many years, during which all attempts of doctors to "awaken" anti-tumor immunity remained unsuccessful.

It was for the discovery of this mechanism and the subsequent creation of new drugs that revolutionized cancer therapy, and was awarded the Nobel Prize in Medicine and Physiology this year.

"The drugs created as a result of this discovery succeeded in the almost impossible - to give some people with previously absolutely fatal diseases that inevitably lead to death a chance for long-term control of the tumor, in some cases for a complete cure," - says Nikolai Zhukov, RIA Novosti Department of Multidisciplinary Oncology, National Medical Research Center of Pediatric Hematology, Oncology and Immunology. Dmitry Rogachev, Associate Professor of the Department of Oncology, Hematology and Radiation Therapy, Russian National Research Medical University named after N. I. Pirogova, board member of the Russian Society of Clinical Oncology (Russco).

Professor James Ellison, 2018 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine

According to the oncologist, these drugs are now used for immunotherapy in people with distant metastases, when the disease has reached the fourth stage. And in a short period from the moment of their first appearance, they proved their effectiveness and began to be officially used in the world for 14 types of tumors.

A new class of drugs has shown its effectiveness for the first time on melanoma.

"Before their appearance, patients with metastases of melanoma lived for less than a year, and we could offer them practically nothing even as a treatment that even slightly prolongs their life. But the very first trials of new immuno-oncological drugs showed that they are not only able to temporarily slow down the tumor. According to published data, without additional supportive therapy, one in five patients treated in these early trials has been alive without signs of illness for seven to eight years or longer. They are cured. So a scientific discovery, awarded the Nobel Prize, gave some patients with a previously one hundred percent incurable disease a chance for a cure, "Zhukov continues.

Of course, drugs have side effects. Since they disinhibit the immune system, it can attack not only the tumor, but also healthy organs and tissues, in some cases causing autoimmune damage, for example, the thyroid gland, pituitary gland, skin, liver, intestines.

"In principle, the drugs of the new class are manageable, with their side effects in most cases can be successfully combated. A certain percentage of side effects is a commensurate payment for the likelihood of avoiding inevitable death from cancer," the expert explains.

It should be understood that immunotherapy does not help everyone, but only those who manage to "turn on" the immune system, forcing it to attack the tumor. In 10 and even 60 percent of patients, depending on the diagnosis, it is possible to achieve a long-term effect.

According to Zhukov, it is hardly possible to find a universal remedy for all types of human tumors, such a "golden bullet", but the fact that new immune drugs are a significant step towards curing at least some of the patients is already obvious.

Why are the new drugs failing to dissolve the immune system in everyone?

"We are all quite different. And our tumors are also different. The origin of tumors is different for everyone, the body reacts to the disease in different ways. Why is someone allergic to nuts, and someone is not? Some develop autoimmune diseases., but others do not? It seems that we all descended from the same ancestors, "- the scientist replies.

Fortunately, research methods are already emerging to predict who will benefit from immunotherapy and who will not, and other approaches need to be sought.

What are the new drugs? These are proteins artificially created in the laboratory - antibodies similar to those with which our body defends itself against pathogens. An antibody is always specific, that is, it acts on a strictly defined target. In this case, the target is molecules that "turn off" (inhibit) the body's immune defense against the tumor. When, under the influence of antibodies administered to the patient intravenously, the "brake" is released, the body's defense works itself.

"The first drugs for immunotherapy were created abroad. Alas, most of the new drugs reach us only as generics - analogues that are produced after the patent protection expires. In order not to wait many years, we have developed our own drug in Russia.", - says the expert.

This is a drug with the number BCD-100, created by the BIOCAD company.

"This is not a copy of those existing abroad, but an original development of a new generation, which belongs to the PD-1 group of inhibitors of immune checkpoints. The drug is in the final stage of clinical trials in humans. Apparently, they did what actually works," concludes Nikolay Zhukov.