A new combination of smart drugs could extend the lives of thousands of cancer patients, new research shows.
Results of the study reveal that the cocktail of two drugs, ipilimumab and nivolumab, "significantly reduced" the size tumours in 40% of patients with terminal kidney cancer, and 10% of those were left with "no detectable sign of cancer" at all.
The findings were revealed at the European Cancer Congress in Denmark.
The two drugs work by blocking the tumour's ability to neutralise key cells in the immune system, allowing the body to mount an all-out assault on the cancer.
The combination has been approved for treating skin cancer melanoma in the UK, but not for the more prevalent kidney and lung cancers.
Peter Waite was given the combination as part of a clinical trial. He had three tumours on his kidney and lungs, and was given three to five years to live.
Now two of the tumours are indetectable, and the third is around 40% smaller.
"It's like having a dark shadow that follows you around taken way," says the 64 year-old from Hertfordshire.
"You have to get on with it anyway. So me and my family, who've been fantastic, did just that, with whatever life I had. And now, well it's just amazing. We don't even think about it anymore really."
But the treatment isn't cheap. Ipilimumab has a list price of £63,000 for a course of just four infusions, while nivolumab costs £5,700 a month and is taken long term.
Consultant oncologist Karol Sikora says: "It costs about £100,000 per patient, and that £100,000 is not there in the NHS budget.
"Will it be found? Almost certainly it will for kidney cancer, with around 11,000 patients a year.
"Will it be found for lung cancer, with 40,000 patients a year? Who knows."
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