This type of cancer killed 33,000 people in France in 2018, according to the National Cancer Institute. Lung cancer is the deadliest cancer in men and the second deadliest in women (behind breast cancer), according to Public Health France.
A treatment, the results of which were revealed on Sunday by the affiliated study authors and AstraZeneca, could improve these numbers. The Swedish-British pharmaceutical group has been funding clinical trials of osimertinib, an anti-cancer drug, for several years.
Phase 3 of this trial involved 682 patients with non-small cell lung cancer (the most common type of lung cancer) and carriers of an EGFR gene mutation. These were patients whose cancer ranged from stage 1 to 3, who underwent tumor resection and, in some cases, chemotherapy. 339 received osimertinib (marketed under the name Tagrisso) and 343 received a placebo.
A 5-year survival of 88%
The results of the clinical trial, published Sunday in The New England Journal of Medicine, show that overall 5-year survival was 88% in the osimertinib group and 78% in the placebo group. Tagrisso “reduces the risk of death by 51%,” says AstraZeneca in a press release.
This medicine acts on the gene called EGFR, “often hyperactive in lung cancer cells, which leads to the uncontrolled growth of cancer cells,” explains the European Medicines Agency in a dedicated sheet.
“By blocking EGFR, osimertinib helps reduce the growth and spread of cancer,” adds this body in charge of evaluating drugs in the European Union.
The conditions that must be met to achieve such a result are for the moment numerous, however warned On twitter Julien Mazières, pulmonologist and oncologist at Toulouse University Hospital, highlighting “real progress but not for everyone”. It can already be administered to interested parties in the European Union.
Source: BFM TV
