CDIMThere was an announcement of the Nobel Prize
The 2020 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine was awarded to Harvey Alter Emeritus Researcher at the National Institutes of Health, Professor Michael Houghton at the University of Alberta in Canada, and Professor Charles Rice at The Rockefeller University in the United States for his discovery of the hepatitis C virus. It was. In addition, the Chemistry Award was awarded to Emmanuelle Charpentier, director of the Maxplank Institute for Infectious Biology, Germany, and Professor Jennifer A. Doudna of the University of California, Berkeley, who developed the genome editing technology CRISPR-Cas9.
Unfortunately, there were no Japanese awards, including Haruki Murakami, a leading candidate for the literary award, but personally, I received two awards this year for medical purposes! I think.
Now, to change the story, there was news in September about Professor Tasuku Honjo of Kyoto University, who won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 2018. If there are omissions and headlines, it seems that something is wrong and the way of reporting is not good, but that is not the case.
Mr. Tasuku Honjo missed declaration of 2.2 billion yen Taxed on deposit of patent consideration(Nikkei 2020.9.10)
It is certain that the teacher is arguing with Ono Pharmaceutical about the price of the invention of the cancer immunosuppressive drug Opdivo, and this topic is a theme I would like to think about somewhere again, but before that, today, "What is cancer immunosuppression?" ? ”Is the column.
Cancer immunotherapy
With the advent of Opdivo, cancer immunotherapy has come into the limelight at once. What is cancer immunotherapy? When it comes to that, there may be surprisingly few people who know it. To do this, we first need to sort out the "relationship between cancer and immunity."
1. Cancer cells have different "faces"
Cancer cells are originally "own" cells, but when normal cells become cancerous, they change to "not yourself = foreign molecules". Since the immune system is a mechanism that eliminates things that are not yourself, it attacks to eliminate the "foreign molecule". It is said that cancer cells are produced every day in a healthy body, but usually the immune system eliminates cancer cells, so they do not get cancer.
1. Therapeutic approach = Targeting cancer-specific antigens → Cancer vaccine therapy, CAR-T therapy (eg, Kimria)
2. Cancer cells change to "avoid" attacks
On the other hand, if the cancer cells are left as they are, they will be attacked by the immune system, so they will make further changes to survive in the body. Molecules that have the function of weakening the action of immunity (immune checkpoint molecules) are made to appear, and they grow to avoid attacks. When this happens, the cancer is no longer attacked by the immune system and the cancer cells grow.
2. Therapeutic approach = Inhibits the mechanism of avoiding immunity → Immune checkpoint inhibitors (eg Opdivo)
Cancer has become a "non-death disease" in many respects due to recent technological innovations, but many cancers are still being developed as "Unmet Medical Needs" for which there is no effective therapeutic drug. It has become an important target for. On the other hand, high costs are also a problem for epoch-making antibody drugs, but in Europe and the United States, success-based drug pricing such as "outcome-based" and "value-based" has emerged, and various new drugs are available. It can be said that this is an area where efforts are being tested.
In medical consulting, I think it would be good to continue to focus on cancer treatment, which is always one of the hot topics.
Responsibility: Ai Ito
Ai Ito (CDI Medical Consultant Co., Ltd.)
Completed a master's course at the Graduate School of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Osaka University (pharmacist). Completed a master's degree at Kyoto University Graduate School of Medicine.
After working as a trading company, an independent venture capital firm, a healthcare / bio venture company, a management consulting firm, etc. Conducts consulting including strategy support and execution support, including mid-term business strategy, new business strategy, overseas development, open innovation strategy, etc., mainly in the life sciences and healthcare field.