This Cancer Treatment Could Also Cure Lupus!

A treatment developed to kill malignant blood cancer cells has been experimentally and successfully administered to patients who have lupus, giving hope to millions for a durable cure for the autoimmune disease.

“We never dared to think about the cure for our disease,” says Anca Askanase, a rheumatologist at Columbia University Irving Medical Center who specializes in lupus.

First developed to kill malignant cells in blood cancer, CAR-T-cell therapy was later used to kill specific white blood cells – B cells – that are known to go haywire with certain autoimmune diseases. CAR-T-cell therapy is believed to work by wiping out enough B cells – even those hiding deep in the body’s tissues – to trigger a “deep reset” of the immune system. CAR-T has already been administered to patients to treat autoimmune diseases like multiple sclerosis, myositis, and myasthenia gravis. So far, 40 people with lupus worldwide have undergone CAR-T-cell therapy, and most have gone into drug-free remission. Large pharmaceutical companies like Bristol Myers Squibb, AstraZeneca, and Novartis are developing their therapies.