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December 29th, 2011 
FAKE NEWS for the Zionist agenda - New trial of 1,500 women shows Avastin
delays the advance of the disease - Doctors believe the drug already used to treat colon cancer could become the standard treatment for ovarian cancer
By
Jenny Hope
Last updated at 2:16 AM on 29th December 2011
A drug can slow down the progress of ovarian cancer – known as the’ silent killer’ – by up to six months, claim researchers.
A new trial of 1,500 women shows Avastin delays the advance of the disease by an average of two months, compared with standard chemotherapy.
But women with the most aggressive disease got the biggest benefit, with the disease stalled for almost six months.
About 4,400 women die each year from the disease, which claims the lives of over 85 per cent of patients if found at a late stage
Avastin, also known as bevacizumab, is already widely used in patients with colon cancer, and doctors believe it will become a standard treatment for ovarian cancer.
Chief investigator Dr Tim Perren, Consultant Oncologist from St James’s Institute of Oncology, St James’s University Hospital, Leeds and Honorary Senior Lecturer at the University of Leeds, said: ‘These results are potentially very encouraging particularly for women with advanced ovarian cancer.
‘Bevacizumab is the first new drug for 15 years to show an advantage over existing treatments for women with this disease.
‘These results are however preliminary and will not be fully confirmed until early 2013.’
Ovarian cancer, which affects almost 7,000 women a year, is dubbed the ‘silent killer’ because symptoms are often diagnosed too late.
About 4,400 women die each year from the disease, which claims the lives of over 85 per cent of patients if found at a late stage when it has spread to other parts of the body.
There has been little improvement in overall survival rates since the introduction of the chemotherapy drug paclitaxel 15 years ago.
Latest findings from an international trial sponsored by the UK Medical Research Council are published in The New England Journal of Medicine.
The trial followed 1.528 ovarian
cancer patients who were randomly allocated to receive either standard
chemotherapy, or a combination of standard treatment and Avastin,
following surgery to remove their tumour.
The researchers recorded the time taken for the disease to return, measured by CT scan.
International trials show Avastin gives women in the late stages of ovarian cancer an extra six months of life
The interim results of the trial, reported after 28 months of follow-up, show an overall slowing down of disease progression by around two months.
The results suggest it may improve overall survival in women, and the biggest effect on delaying the disease was found in women with an aggressive form of the disease – by almost six months.
Professor Max Parmar, director of the MRC Clinical Trials Unit and co-author of the study, said ‘This suggests that bevacizumab could be considered as a treatment for women with an advanced form of the disease, or whose cancer has come back after chemotherapy treatment.
‘However, the decision on whether to include the drug routinely should be delayed until we have further evidence on its impact on overall survival.’
Avastin is a ‘targeted’ cancer therapy that works by blocking the development of new blood vessels and interfering with the tumour’s ability to grow and spread to other parts of the body.
Combining the drug with chemotherapy has been shown to improve the effectiveness of treatment in several other forms of the disease including lung, kidney and colorectal cancers, although it has proved to be less effective than hoped in breast cancer.
Annwen Jones, chief executive of Target Ovarian Cancer, said ‘It is very exciting and positive news for women living with ovarian cancer in the UK.
It is the first glimmer of hope that there are significant advancements in treatments for ovarian cancer on the horizon at last.
‘We said previously the real challenge was to find well-tolerated treatments that prolong the lives of women, and it seems that Avastin is now a significant step nearer to realising that goal.’
Roche, which manufactures the drug, has applied to the European Medicines Agency for a licence to use it to treat ovarian cancer and a decision is expected shortly.
It will need to be approved by the NHS rationing body, Nice, before it is widely used but in the meantime cancer specialists can apply for funding on behalf of patients to the Cancer Drugs Fund in England.
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@ HD Chessington – your comment mirrors my experience exactly. I lost my dear mum to OC in 2009 after about 6 months of Chemo radio therapy, but the cancer was far too aggressive to respond. It was soul destroying to see her suffer and she will never know how wonderful her 3 year old grandson is who was just 1 when she died. Ovarian cancer is a nasty disease that crept up on my mum and took her life so cruelly. I would give anything to have her back, but only if she were free of disease pain. It has taken me months of counselling to try to come to terms with losing her. I wish you the best.
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– Stockport Bloke, Stockport, England, 29/12/2011 07:43 You clearly have never lost a loved one to cancer.
I’m much happier for our tax money to help those with a terminal illness spend more time with their loved ones than paying for sex change operations, boob jobs or IVF. The NHS is meant to be for those who are ILL and this fits the bill. (We’ve lost many family members to cancer its an awful illness and if this can provide a little more time for those people then its worth every penny)
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Actually Stockport Bloke, it’s around £69,000 per patient per course of treatment, and you cannot get it on the NHS at all, only via private medical insurance (I work in the sector) or if you fund it yourself. So don’t worry, anyone who needs this “very expensive and profitable” (not to mention sometimes life saving) drug will not be draining your tax money.
Life is worth so much more than money.
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I lost my mum to ovarian cancer in 2006. She had many different types of chemo and endured a lot of pain during treatment and operations. She’d also worked all her life paying tax and NI ‘Stockport Bloke’. She now won’t receive a pension because the OC took her from us far too soon, depriving my child from knowing his nan and me of my dear mum. I hope you never loose a loved one to this evil disease. Maybe if your life was touched by cancer you would think before you post your diatribe.
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Stockport bloke – would you be saying that if it was your mum or sister who had ovarian cancer? I very much doubt it. How insensitive and naive you are. I hope you are never put in that position.
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life is more precious than money! Stockport bloke.
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This article fails to mention the cost of Avastin, which is around £21,000 per patient for a course of treatment, making it a very nice little earner for its makers, Roche. That is a lot of money for the NHS to shell out for one single patient. £21,000 could, for example, pay a nurse’s salary for the best part of a year instead. I’m sure Roche will be very grateful to the DM for this nice, uncritical plug for their very expensive and profitable drug
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