ManicDDaily

An article, “An Immune System Trained to Kill Cancer,” in yesterday’s New York Times tells of a potential new cancer treatment that reprograms the T-cells (white blood cells) of cancer patients with new genes especially armed to fight cancer.

The article (by Denise Grady) details the work of a team of scientists at University of Pennsylvania, led by Dr. Carl June, and describes the cases of three patients whose last stage cancer was apparently put in partial or full remission due to the treatment.

The treatment relies, amazingly, on an altered HIV-1 virus (the virus that causes AIDS):
“The AIDS virus is a natural for this kind of treatment, Dr. June said, because it evolved to invade T-cells. The idea of putting any form of the AIDS virus into people sounds a bit frightening, he acknowledged, but the virus used by his team was “gutted” and was no longer harmful. Other researchers had altered and disabled the virus by adding DNA from humans, mice and cows, and from a virus that infects woodchucks and another that infects cows. Each bit was chosen for a particular trait, all pieced together into a vector that Dr. June called a ‘Rube Goldberg-like solution” and “truly a zoo.’”

I want to emphasize a couple of important words here. How about ”evolved?” And “DNA?”

I guess I’m still thinking about the CNN Tea Party Republican debate last night at the Florida State Fair. It just seems very strange to me to have leaders talking about their superior approach to health care and education, their closer relationship to smart phones as opposed to pay phones, who also profess not to believe in the theory of evolution, or who are, at least, unwilling to own up to such a belief.

Thank you, Dr. Carl June, and other oncologists involved in this fascinating, and evolving, research.