Virotherapy

A new study has, for the first time, demonstrated that a specific kind of virotherapy can infect and kill cancer in humans, leaving healthy cells unharmed.

“This is the first study to establish the feasibility of systemic oncolytic virotherapy for disseminated cancer,” said Dr. Stephen Russell, a Mayo Clinic hematologist, and first author of the paper and co-developer of the therapy in a statement.

Using re-engineered viruses to fight cancer, also known as oncolytic virotherapy, is nothing new, dating back to the 1950s, according to the Mayo Clinic.