A new drug combo recently approved by the Food & Drug Administration can halt lung cancer in its treacherous tracks — for over 40% longer than previously possible, a wide-ranging trial funded by pharmaceutical giant Janssen showed.
Doctors are hailing the breakthrough as “amazing.”
Lung cancer kills roughly 1.8 million people per year. The insidious disease is known for very low survival rates, particularly in those in advanced stages.
The Guardian reported that a group of patients in that precarious state were given a cocktail of amivantamab, a monoclonal antibody, and lazertinib, a tyrosine kinase inhibitor — keeping them alive and progression-free for an average of 23.7 months.
Sufferers who received the standard treatment, a drug called osimertinib, averaged 16.6 months of progression-free survival, the outlet revealed.
The findings come as experts reportedly hail a “golden age” of cancer research that is leading to better comprehension and better treatment methods.
“It’s amazing to see this new combination shows longer cancer control than osimertinib, which was itself a breakthrough treatment only a few years ago,” said Martin Forster, the UK trial chief and a medical oncologist at University College Hospital, said.
“Better understanding of the biology that drives lung cancers has guided the development of these targeted therapies,” Forster explained.
More than 1,000 patients were enrolled in the phase 3 trial, conducted during 2020-2022 in multiple countries.
All were in the advanced stages of the common non-small cell lung cancer, or NSCLC.
They were randomly assigned to either the drug combo or the standard treatment the group of patients would have all have normally received.
“By combining these two drugs, which stop the cancer from growing in different ways, we see a significant improvement in progression-free survival rates compared to the drug we currently use,” said Raffaele Califano, a consultant in medical oncology involved with the trail.
“Survival rates for lung cancer are still very low compared with other types of the disease and so to see such positive results is a welcome development.”
“We are in a golden age of cancer research where a greater understanding of what drives specific cancers is informing new and better ways to beat the disease,” Anna Kinsella of Cancer Research UK told The Guardian.
“Research like this helps more people to live longer, better lives, free from the fear of cancer.”
The FDA gave the go-ahead to the treatment in August.
The Post previously reported that researchers are campaigning to ban cigarette sales to Gen Z smokers — saying that the move would save 1.2 million lives normally lost to lung cancer, over a period of 70 years.
