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Lung Cancer patients can now live longer

28/Sep/2006: A new experimental drug discovered in New Zealand has provided hope to millions of lung cancer patients, worldwide. Doctors feel that the discovery of this new drug is a milestone in the fight against this disease.

Lung cancer is the most lethal of all forms of cancer and the survival rate of patients affected by this disease is very low. Most of the patients suffering from lung cancer live for less than five years, but this new drug could extend their lives by a third. In spite of the developments in treating lung cancer, the death rate of this disease has remained the same for more than a decade.

This new drug, known as AS1404, was discovered by researchers in New Zealand and developed by a U.K based Biotechnology Company called, Antisoma, with the support of Cancer Research UK. A phase-II trial of this drug carried out on 70 patients with non –small – cell lung cancer; found that this drug extended their lives by over 5 months, when compared to other patients who received only chemotherapy.

This new drug belongs to a class of compounds called ‘Vascular Disrupting Agents’, which selectively destroy the blood vessels that feeds the tumors. The success of the phase II trial will help the research to progress to the phase III study, which would ultimately determine the licensing of the drug. This drug has already been proved effective in the phase II trials of Prostrate and Ovarian cancer.

Mark McKeage, one of the researchers in this study, from University of Auckland, feels very optimistic of progressing to the Phase III testing. Professor Alex Markham, chief executive of Cancer Research UK, said that the drug development team from the Cancer Research UK, played an important role in the early development of this drug and they are feeling delighted with the phase II trial results and are eager to see the performance of AS1404 on a much larger number of patients.

K Siva

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