NorthWest Biotherapeutics Inc (NWBO)

[Poor Man -]

Okay, on the couch minding my own business and reading National Geo, and this article pops up on emerging cancer treatments. And just as a coincidence this article pops up that supports my contention that D is subject to real competitive risk, and a buyer might not be willing to pay a big premium for a treatment that will be years in development.

Except from Nat Geo:

New cancer treatments may be on the horizon—thanks to mRNA vaccines

Currently, phase one and phase two clinical trials are recruiting participants or are underway to assess the efficacy, tolerability, and safety of therapeutic mRNA vaccines to treat various forms of cancer. These include melanoma, non-small cell lung cancers, gastrointestinal cancer, breast cancer, ovarian cancer, and pancreatic cancer, among others.

“One of the beauties of this technology is it can be used in people agnostic to their cancer type—it doesn’t matter if it’s a breast cancer or lung cancer as long as you can identify its mutations,” says Van Morris, a physician and an assistant professor of gastrointestinal medical oncology at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston who is leading a phase two clinical trial exploring the use of personalized mRNA vaccines for patients who have stage II or stage III colorectal cancer. “One of the exciting things is the adaptability of the technology based on a given cancer and the underlying biology of that cancer.”

Over the course of 27 weeks, Cassidy received nine injections of a personalized mRNA vaccine along with intravenous infusions of an immunotherapy drug called Pembrolizumab. She saw her doctor, Julie E. Bauman, deputy director of the University of Arizona Cancer Center, on a weekly basis at first then every three weeks; she also had regular CT scans. After each injection, Cassidy would spike a fever and feel wiped out—with fatigue and body aches and pains—for 24 hours. “My immune system was really flaring up, which is what we wanted to happen so it could fight the cancer,” she explains.

By the time the treatment concluded in October 2020, Cassidy’s CT scans were clean: There was no evidence of cancer in her body.