The Common Plant Virus May Be the Answer To Cancer Treatment
Veterinary radiation specialist Jack Hoopes is exploring the effectiveness of a new cancer treatment which is derived from a common plant virus.
These patients who participated in the study were dogs. Hoopes spent his decades-long career involved in canine cancer treatment and hopes to develop human treatments based on his latest experimental therapies.
These furry patients were diagnosed with a common oral cancer that will almost certainly result in death within a few months if left untreated. Using this common plant virus as a viral therapy, several of the dogs had their tumors disappear entirely and did not experience recurring cancer.
Given that around 85 percent of dogs with oral cancer will develop a new tumor within a year of radiation therapy, the results of this experiment were striking. According to Hoopes, if a treatment works in dog cancer, it has the potential to work at some level in human patients. This treatment could save both human lives and canine lives as well.
This viral therapy is derived from the cowpea mosaic virus, or CPMV, a pathogen named after the mottled pattern it creates on the leaves of infected cowpea plants. Although the virus did not replicate in mammals as it does in plants, it still triggered an immune response that could mean effective treatment against a wide variety of cancers.
The target of this to therapy is to allow the immune system to recognize the presence of cancerous cells so it can fight back. The most puzzling thing about cancer is that the body's immune system does not immediately recognize a cancerous cell when it sees one as cancer cells possess properties that can trick the immune system into thinking nothing is wrong.
More about: Sickle Cell Disease Complicated With EOD Significantly Raised Healthcare Costs
How The Virus Works?
In situ vaccination is the process of injecting an oncolytic virus into a developing tumor. This can disrupt the cancer cells and stimulate the immune system to attack the tumorous cells.
Hoopes injected 200 micrograms of these virus-like particles or three times the dose of a typical flu vaccine directly into their tumors. These particles are not live cowpea mosaic viruses but rather inactivated viruses where their genetic material has been removed so they can't replicate.
Each of the dogs received four doses of viral therapy for a period of two weeks together with their standard radiation therapy. The dog's immune system was able to recognize the pathogens as foreign bodies and goes into attack mode, taking down the cancerous cells with them.
CPMV has proven to be more effective than other viruses in acting as an immune system bait, while more studies are required to understand what makes CPMV so uniquely effective, it has a positive impact on cancer treatment as it worked better than radiation itself.
Oncolytic Viral Therapy
Oncolytic viral therapy is a new cancer treatment strategy where it leads to the lysis of the tumor mass and creates an immune system response.
This therapy is delivered through a systemic route, intravenous injection so that it can search out cancerous cells and kill them along with the main tumor. The alternative would be to do a surgery, but because cancer is usually not confined to a single region, surgery may be difficult, and if only a certain area was treated, cancer may come back. By delivering the virus via the IV route, there is a better chance of succeeding in killing the cancer cells.
Further reading: Do Vitamins Help in the Body's Fight Against Coronavirus?
Check out more news and information on Cancer on MD News Daily.
Oct 11, 2020 10:03 PM EDT
