X-Message-Number: 10784 From: "Olaf Henny" <> Subject: Re: CryoNet #10768; More on the Reovirus Date: Sat, 14 Nov 1998 22:15:02 -0800 Re: Cryonet #10768; More on The Reovirus I have tried to post here Friday's detailed article in the Calgary Herald through their "Pass the Message on To a Friend" (or some similar such name) dialogue box. Unfortunately, as I found out this morning, this posting never arrived here at Cryonet and was consequently lost for me too. I have since asked the Herald for a copy via e-mail and will post it here, if and when I get it. Meanwhile I am appending below a new article in Saturdays Herald, which reports on some of the reactions of the Canadian approving authorities, who are apparently quite prepared to fast track the testing on humans. Best, Olaf Cancer cure tests could hit fast track Julian Beltrame, Southam News and Eva Ferguson, Calgary Herald. Health Canada is prepared to fast track testing on a potential cure for some types of cancer, discovered by University of Calgary researchers, a regulator said Friday. Dr. Anthony Ridgway of Health Canada's biologics and radiopharmaceuticals division said the department will go as fast as researchers want to test whether the so-called reovirus forms the basis for a cure. "We can go as fast as they can go," Ridgway said. Officials said patient trials could begin in six months -- a year earlier than anticipated. But they said that even under the best of circumstances, it could take at least 12 to 18 months before a reovirus product is available on the market. News of the breakthrough came Thursday, and researchers have been inundated by calls from cancer patients and the news media. "My ears are still red from talking on the phone all day," said Dr. Patrick Lee, who has tested the potential cure in which tumours are attacked by a virus that kills only cancer cells. "We've been getting so many calls and e-mails, mostly from people with cancer and their concerned families. . . . We even had a call from someone who has a dog with bone cancer." Lee has tested the virus on 25 types of cancer cells, including breast, brain, prostate and pancreatic. Twenty of the 25 types of cells were killed during tests on mice. "We're very happy that so many people are so interested, and we're excited by the prospects. But we don't want people to get their hopes up too high," Lee said. Dr. Sandy Patterson, director of medicine for the Tom Baker Cancer Centre, said approval for tests on patients could come within six months. "Right from the word go the clinicians here at the Tom Baker Cancer Centre have been very supportive. We want to get going on it." Patterson said the first phase of the treatment would begin with 20 to 25 patients, most of whom are already seeking care at the Tom Baker Cancer Centre. The chosen few, he added, will be among those patients whose cancer has progressed and who are no longer responding to any other treatments. Patients with exterior lesions, some of which are commonly found in cancers of the breast, mouth, throat or larynx, may be good candidates since the virus can be injected through the lesions. "The exciting part is that this is happening in Calgary," Patterson said. Findings by Lee and his team are contained in an article published Friday in Science magazine. The promise of the reovirus is that, where normally it has trouble replicating in healthy human cells, the mechanism that limits its growth is released in cancerous cells, thereby allowing the reovirus to grow and kill cancerous cells while leaving healthy ones unaffected. Ridgway cautioned that a similar frenzy occurred this summer after the New York Times reported that endostatin had shrunk tumours in mice. But that proved to be a false trail in humans. "This is a promising development, but no more promising than others that have turned out not to work," he said. One issue he foresees is that the reovirus doesn't normally invade the brain, "so we don't know whether it would replicate in the brain." Matt Coffey, a researcher on Lee's team, said the team of researchers has formed a company that has patented the reovirus, and may be looking for outside investment to proceed with human testing, which can be very expensive. Although he understands that cancer patients are anxious for any promising lead to be developed as rapidly as possible, Ridgway cautioned against going too quickly. "If they proceed too fast and make mistakes, and don't get the data they need or things take a downturn, they may lose the backing for an additional trial," he explained. He said the procedure is to have a two-phase trial. Phase one would be mostly concerned with testing the safety of the virus in humans, to ensure it does not cause more harm than good, followed by a second set of tests to determine whether it indeed kills cancer cells. If early tests show miraculous results, the process can be speeded up, he said. For instance, the researchers could quickly get permission for a large clinical trial, or for compassionate cases involved patients at death's door, even before the product gets final approval and becomes generally available. Coffey said he is not concerned that the virus is toxic. "All the animal studies we've done so far, there's just a surprising lack of side-effects," he said. "We thought that would be a huge hurdle, but the initial animals (mice) were done in April and we still have those animals without side-effects, they're bouncing around the cage quite content." Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=10784