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Article Source: the Mail onlineA pill that rapidly shrinks the most deadly of skin tumours has been hailed as the dawn of a new era in cancer treatment.
The finding has been likened to the discovery of penicillin.
Known as PLX4032, it is the first cancer drug to harness knowledge from the full decoding of human DNA, and has produced 'spectacular' trial results
It dramatically cut tumour size in 24 of the 32 men and women taking part in a trial. In two other cases it made the tumour completely disappear.
All the patients had late-stage malignant melanoma, in which the cancer had spread through the body.
The drug, which could be on the market in as little as a year, is the first to capitalise on the ‘treasure trove’ of knowledge gained by the decoding of the human genome a decade ago.
Yesterday, Mark Walport, director of the Wellcome Trust, which played a key role in producing the first human genetic blueprint, likened PLX4032’s discovery to a ‘penicillin moment’.
Just as the discovery of penicillin opened the floodgates to an array of bacteria-fighting antibiotics, our ever-growing knowledge about DNA and its quirks and flaws is leading to the production of many more drugs like PLX4032.
Sir Mark told Radio 4’s Today programme that the benefits of the Human Genome Project were now being reaped ‘on a grand scale’.
He said: ‘We have moved into a rational era of understanding cancer. This is about identifying the cancer, knowing what its changes are and being able to follow it in ways we could never have dreamt of before.’
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