News — SEATTLE — AUG. 30, 2017 — Today the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved the use of a new Novartis immunotherapy drug, CTL019, as a treatment for advanced leukemia in children and young adults.
This latest FDA ruling validates the importance of similar lifesaving cellular immunotherapies currently being developed and tested by and other National Cancer Institute-designated cancer centers.
, medical director of cellular immunotherapy at Fred Hutch and medical director of the Bezos Family Immunotherapy Clinic at Seattle Cancer Care Alliance, Fred Hutch’s clinical care partner, offered the following statement:
“Although narrow in scope, today’s FDA ruling is a milestone. This is the first approval for the use of genetically engineered immune cells as a treatment for cancer and is an important validation of technical advances under way in the field of cellular immunotherapy, in which we modify cells from a patient’s own immune system to seek out and eliminate cancer cells. We at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center believe this is just the first of what will soon be many new immunotherapy-based treatments for a variety of cancers.
“Approvals are an important step, but they’re just the beginning. The safety, availability and affordability of these new immunotherapies can be improved, but to achieve these goals we need an increase in industry partnerships, more corporate investments and continued government funding. This increased collaboration and funding will allow us to make further investments in fundamental research and development into how the immune system interacts with cancer, and to pursue advances in cell-engineering techniques so that clinical trials can be accelerated and these experimental therapies be made available to more patients.”
Fred Hutch is currently testing new experimental T-cell therapies for breast cancer, leukemia, lymphoma, lung cancer, Merkel cell carcinoma and mesothelioma.
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Media Contact:
Jonathan Rabinovitz O: 206.667.6906 M: 206.658.7612 [email protected]
At , home to three Nobel laureates, interdisciplinary teams of world-renowned scientists seek new and innovative ways to prevent, diagnose and treat cancer, HIV/AIDS and other life-threatening diseases. Fred Hutch’s pioneering work in bone marrow transplantation led to the development of immunotherapy, which harnesses the power of the immune system to treat cancer. An independent, nonprofit research institute based in Seattle, Fred Hutch houses the nation’s first cancer prevention research program, as well as the clinical coordinating center of the Women’s Health Initiative and the international headquarters of the HIV Vaccine Trials Network.
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