Word: interferon
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Subsequently, other researchers learned that the protein had antitumor as well as antiviral properties. Though exactly how it works is still a mystery, interferon appears not only to block the uncontrolled cell division that is characteristic of cancer but also to stimulate the body's immune system to kill cancer cells. Interferon has another plus; apparently because it is produced in the body, it has none of the unpleasant and debilitating side effects that accompany conventional cancer chemotherapy...
...Though interferon has raised the hopes of doctors and laymen alike since its discovery (in a 1960 Flash Gordon comic strip, medics used it to combat an extraterrestrial virus), it is so difficult to recover from cells that only minute quantities have been available for testing. Most interferon, including the supply that will be used in the new tests, comes from Finland, where it is extracted at great expense from white blood cells collected from Red Cross blood donors. As a result, as little as a millionth of an ounce of pure interferon costs close...
...Interferon is likely to remain expensive for some time to come. Scientists have not yet fully determined the structure of the interferon molecule and thus cannot bring down the cost by synthesizing it. Nor have they isolated the gene that orders interferon production in the cell. Once that gene is determined, Gutterman says, the technique of recombinant DNA could be used to insert it into a laboratory strain of E. coli bacteria, which would then multiply and produce interferon inexpensively and in large quantities...
Until that day comes, and indeed until and if the new tests of interferon demonstrate that it is truly effective, medical experts are warning cancer victims and their relatives against undue optimism Says A.C.S. official and former National Cancer Institute Director Frank J Rauscher Jr.: "Interferon is just one of thousands of substances being tested for antitumor activity. The only way to find out if interferon is any good is to buy the material and get the research started That's where we are today...
...Patients with advanced cases of certain cancers of the skin, bone, lymph system, breast, lung and bladder will receive interferon at Houston's M.D. Anderson; the Sloan-Kettering Institute for Cancer Research and the Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons, both in Manhattan; Buffalo's Roswell Park Memorial Institute; the Stanford University Medical Center in Palo Alto, Calif...