Beata Halasi, a virologist from the University of Zagreb in Croatia, has self-treated herself against breast cancer recurrence, an approach that raises ethical concerns, according to Nature.
Halasi is head of the research unit at the University’s Center for Research and Knowledge Transfer in the Field of Biotechnology. She has just added her name to the long list of those scientists who have decided to use their own bodies as experimental subjects, using a mixture of viruses she obtained in her laboratory, to treat breast cancer.
The results of this experiment, which his colleagues at the university hospital followed, were published in the journal Vaccines last August, referred to in Nature magazine, and written about by the French website Le Temps.
The researcher was diagnosed with stage III cancer in her left breast in 2016, and was treated through a mastectomy followed by chemotherapy. The tumor appeared for the first time in 2018 and was removed through surgery, but a small mass of less than one centimeter was left at the site of the removal, and it was subject to monitoring.
Two years later, a second relapse was discovered in the then 49-year-old virologist, as the mass turned into a tumor nodule under the skin. She then decided to put herself on an as-yet-unapproved treatment called oncolytic virotherapy (OVT) to avoid the pain of chemotherapy.
Self-treatment
Since this controversial self-treatment, Halacy has been cancer-free for 4 years. “It took courage to publish this study,” says the virologist at Nature magazine.
Oncolytic virotherapy consists of injecting viruses capable of attacking cancer cells, while leaving healthy cells intact, directly into the tumor. When cancer cells are destroyed, they release more viruses as well as cellular debris which stimulates the immune system against both the viruses and the tumor. The first observations – about the existence of such viruses and their ability to reduce tumor size – date back several decades.
Most clinical research in recent years has been conducted on oncolytic virotherapy using Talimogene laherparepvec T-VEC therapy based on a modified herpes virus, such as a 2015 study published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology that demonstrates the benefits of this approach in infected patients. Advanced skin cancer.
The viral therapy T-VGC has been approved in the United States to treat these aggressive melanomas. Other recent research has focused on the early stages of the disease. Oncolytic viral therapy for breast cancer has not been licensed anywhere in the world.
In an interview with Nature magazine, Halacy confirmed that she is not a specialist in oncolytic viral therapy, but her experience in cultivating and purifying viruses in the laboratory gave her enough confidence to try the treatment herself. She chose two attenuated viruses: measles and vesicular stomatitis (rhabdovirus, from the same family as the rabies virus).
The virologist has already worked with both viruses, and both provide a good level of security, according to her. The measles strain she chose is widely used in childhood vaccines, and the vesicular stomatitis virus strain causes, at worst, mild flu-like symptoms.
Immune response
To improve the treatment, one of her colleagues injected her with the two viral preparations sequentially over a period of two months to block antiviral immunity, which had been developed during treatment, to prevent the virus from destroying the cancer cells. Oncologists agreed to follow her while she self-treated in order to switch to chemotherapy.
Analysis of the tumor after resection showed the presence of infiltrating immune cells demonstrating the effect of experimental oncolytic viral therapy. “The immune response was definitely stimulated,” Hallacy told Nature. After the operation, she was treated with trastuzumab, an anti-cancer drug, for a year.
The researcher was subjected to more than 12 publication rejections by scientific journal editors before her study was accepted by the journal Vaccines. Their main concern was always ethical, because the research paper, which the researcher co-wrote with her colleagues, involved conducting self-experiments (on herself).
About breast cancer
Breast cancer is the most common type of cancer among women, whether in developed or developing countries, and several factors cause the disease, including lifestyle and genetics. According to the World Health Organization, early detection of breast cancer remains the best way to improve the chances of recovery for those affected and reduce the death rate resulting from the disease.
Nearly 1,380,000 new cases of breast cancer are recorded every year, and 458,000 deaths occur from it, including 269,000 in developing countries. That is, most deaths are recorded in poor and developing countries, and this is due to a lack of awareness of the disease and late detection of it, which reduces the possibility of recovery and raises the risk of death.
Breast cancer occurs when some cells in it begin to grow abnormally as a result of a mutation or change in the genetic material, and then spread to the rest of the breast areas and to the lymph nodes, and from there to other parts of the body. Breast cancer usually begins in the cells of the ducts that produce milk, and it may also begin in the glandular tissue in the breast.
Genetics plays an important aspect in contracting the disease, as it is believed that 5% to 10% of breast cancer cases are caused by a genetic mutation that is inherited through generations. Scientists have identified two genes associated with an increased risk of breast cancer, which are “BRCA 1 and 2” (BRCA 1 and 2). The presence of these two genes in a woman increases her risk of developing ovarian cancer.