A groundbreaking cancer treatment for childhood leukemia uses patients' own genetically altered immune cells to fight the disease. It is the first gene therapy to be allowed in the United States — a "historic" approval, the Food and Drug Administration said.
The decision clears the Novartis drug, called Kymriah, for treatment with children and young adults whose illness doesn't respond to traditional approaches. That group numbers only 600 or so patients a year in this country. But the customized treatment is also being tested for a range of diseases from non-Hodgkin lymphoma and multiple myeloma to solid tumors, and its approval signals a new chapter in treating cancer by mobilizing the body's own immune system.
"We're entering a new frontier in medical innovation with the ability to reprogram a patient's own cells to attack a deadly cancer," said FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb.
| |  | | Democracy Dies in Darkness | | | | | | Health Alert | Wed., Aug. 30, 2017 12:18 p.m. | | | | | | FDA approves first-of-its-kind 'living drug' for childhood leukemia | A groundbreaking cancer treatment for childhood leukemia uses patients' own genetically altered immune cells to fight the disease. It is the first gene therapy to be allowed in the United States — a "historic" approval, the Food and Drug Administration said.
The decision clears the Novartis drug, called Kymriah, for treatment with children and young adults whose illness doesn't respond to traditional approaches. That group numbers only 600 or so patients a year in this country. But the customized treatment is also being tested for a range of diseases from non-Hodgkin lymphoma and multiple myeloma to solid tumors, and its approval signals a new chapter in treating cancer by mobilizing the body's own immune system.
"We're entering a new frontier in medical innovation with the ability to reprogram a patient's own cells to attack a deadly cancer," said FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb. | | Read more » | | | |
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