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 With its French partner Cellectis, Pfizer is in the early stages of
developing new cancer treatments called CAR T cells it says has
major medical and manufacturing advantages over similar cell
therapies being developed by others.
The treatments are T-cells, white blood cells that act as soldiers
against foreign invaders, that have been genetically altered to make
them better able to spot and attack cancer.
Pfizer research chief Mikael Dolsten said the treatments, if
successful, could be a next big thing against cancer, following the
recent launch of another impressive group of cancer drugs called
checkpoint inhibitors. Those medicines, launched by Merck & Co and
Bristol-Myers Squibb Co, take the brakes off the immune system
rather than genetically tweaking immune system cells to spot and
destroy cancer cells.
"CAR T cells can probably be more powerful," Dolsten said in an
interview.
Novartis and smaller biotechs Kite Pharma and Juno Therapeutics are
farthest along in developing CART T cells, which in some small
early-stage trials have eliminated all trace of blood cancers in as
many as 90 percent of patients who had run out of other options. If
approved, some analysts expect the treatments to cost as much as
$450,000 for a single treatment.
Their drugs are made by removing T-cells from the patient,
genetically altering them to seek out a specific protein found on
cancer cells and infusing the cells back into the patient, a process
that can take weeks.
Pfizer, with Cellectis' technology, aims to make off-the-shelf CAR T
cells that can be used immediately. Instead of using the patient's
own T-cells, its so-called allogeneic approach involves a single
healthy donor who can potentially supply T-cells that can treat
thousands of patients.
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But to succeed and be safe, those engineered cells would have to be
further altered to ensure a patient’s body does not reject the
foreign cells, triggering a potentially deadly immune system
response.
The Pfizer/Cellectis method would allow the T-cells to be
manufactured at lower cost and be shipped to hospitals.
Pfizer believes it is uniquely placed to produce high quality
off-the-shelf cells in quantities needed to treat thousands of
patients.
"None of the other companies have that capability," Pfizer CEO Ian
Read said at the JP Morgan Healthcare Conference in San Francisco.
"Therefore they could not go that route."
(Reporting by Ransdell Pierson)
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