The odds seem good: A record 861 cancer drugs are in the research pipeline, including several in Colorado. Perhaps at least one will provide a cure for the second-deadliest disease in America.
In a nod to Colorado’s booming biotech industry, Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America issued a report in Denver on Wednesday responding to President Barack Obama’s call in February for “a cure for cancer in our time.”
“Colorado is clearly becoming one of the significant players in terms of oncology drug development,” said Timothy Rodell, chief executive of GlobeImmune, a Louisville company founded by three University of Colorado scientists. “There is lot happening here right now.”
The biotech company is still several years away from getting its cancer drug in pharmacies. Researchers now are conducting clinical trials with pancreatic-cancer and lung-cancer patients.
GlobeImmune’s patented technology involves yeast, the same kind used to brew beer and bake bread. Scientists train the yeast to work with the immune system, targeting and killing proteins in cancer cells.
Another Colorado company, Allos Therapeutics of Westminster, just applied to the Food and Drug Administration to market its drug, pralatrexate.
The drug would be the first to fight an aggressive type of non- Hodgkin’s lymphoma now treated with chemotherapy. The blood cancer, called peripheral T-cell lymphoma, has a five-year survival rate of 25 percent.
A clinical trial involving 109 patients found 27 percent had their tumor stop growing or shrink. The drug’s positive effect on those patients lasted 9 1/2 months on average, according to Allos Therapeutics’ website.
PhRMA executives, joined by Lt. Gov. Barbara O’Brien and “Family Ties” actress and breast-cancer survivor Meredith Baxter, released the report at the state Capitol on Wednesday.
Cancer drugs and vaccines under development across the country include 122 for lung cancer, the country’s deadliest cancer, 107 for breast cancer, 70 for colon cancer and 103 for prostate cancer.
PhRMA senior vice president Ken Johnson said the number of cancer drugs and vaccines in development jumped from about 750 last year and under 700 the year before.
“I think it really shows that there is a commitment in this country, as President Obama has called upon, to end cancer in our lifetime,” he said.
The press conference happened in Colorado to recognize political leaders here who realize “science drives innovation and innovation drives the economy,” Johnson said.
More than 500,000 Americans are expected to die of cancer this year; only heart disease kills more people in the U.S.
The most commonly diagnosed cancer in Colorado is breast cancer, followed by prostate and lung cancers.
