In recent years, there has been a particular proliferation of advertisements for biological therapies for cancer, many of which are promoted by regular large hospitals. How can we identify the scams and false claims among them? If any hospital claims that it is a new invention of the hospital or a new immunotherapy or biotherapy unique in the country, you can be sure that it is a fraud. If any hospital or individual boasts that his new biologic therapy has an amazingly high cure rate and no other institution has repeatedly verified it, it is almost certainly a fraud. In various media such as internet, TV and newspapers, one can always see various medical advertisements. Among them, cancer treatment advertisements are especially numerous and eye-catching. Because cancer patients are facing a life and death decision, they are often willing to spend all their money in order to survive. In recent years, there has been a proliferation of advertisements for biological cancer therapies. If you search for cancer and biologic therapies in Chinese on the Internet, there are 860,000 results. When you click in, many of them boast of the amazing treatment effect and how many cancer patients have been cured, and there is no lack of propaganda from regular large hospitals. It seems that biologic therapy has become the mainstream of cancer treatment and the last hope for cancer patients. I am afraid that ordinary people are aware that the main treatments for cancer at this stage include surgery, chemotherapy and radiotherapy. Unfortunately, although these mainstream tools have made great progress and cured many early stage cancers, the overall efficacy is still very unsatisfactory. The high side effects and unsatisfactory efficacy inevitably lead us to seek other, better options. Biological therapies were born in such an environment. Coupled with the propaganda in the press and media, patients with advanced cancer who hold a dead horse for a cure have then turned their attention to this futuristic and friendly-sounding biologic therapy. However, most of them are scams, or unproven treatments, which are lightly said to take advantage of patients’ psychology of seeking medical help in a hurry to solicit money, and heavily said to delay regular and effective treatment, resulting in wasting precious time, which is tantamount to harming life. Therefore, it is necessary to popularize the actual status of current cancer biologic therapies. Which biological therapies are really effective? What is biologic therapy First of all, it is necessary to clarify what is biologic therapy for cancer. Biological therapy for cancer, also called immunotherapy, both terms express the same meaning. It is a therapy that uses part of the body’s own immune system to attack cancer cells in order to suppress or even kill them. The earliest recorded cancer immunotherapy is thought to have started in the early 19th century with the American physician William Coley. William Coley (1862-1936), an American physician in the early 19th century. At that time, we still did not know anything about the human immune system. During the treatment of cancer patients, Dr. Coley accidentally discovered that the unfortunate infection after surgery seemed to be helpful in treating cancer. So the daring Colet began to experiment in his clinic. He deliberately infected cancer patients with certain bacteria that produced toxins in the body, and some patients really showed good results. This toxin became known in later years as Coley’s toxin. He was ready to continue the experiment, but was quickly defeated by the rapid development of chemotherapy and radiation therapy at the time. Because although chemotherapy and radiation were ineffective at that time, bacterial infections could be fatal. Since then, surgery, radiotherapy and chemotherapy have become the mainstay of cancer treatment. Immunotherapy has been put aside for the time being because we know so little about the body’s immune system that there is no way to power it. However, medicine has progressed. Over the past two centuries, our understanding of immunity has advanced step by step. Various advances in biotechnology have also given the possibility to synthesize various biological agents. Various studies have emerged. Immunotherapy has received increasing attention from the medical community because of its novelty, low side effects, precise targeting and clear efficacy. In the last decade, it has been advancing rapidly and is gradually becoming the fourth option after surgery and radiotherapy. Before introducing the specific immunotherapy, let’s talk about what is the immune system. Our immune system is an army of organs, cells, or substances that protect us from invasion by foreign bacteria and viruses. The immune system includes the bone marrow, the spleen, the tonsils, the lymph nodes, and so on. These organs produce cells or immune substances that are circulated throughout the body to kill foreign pathogens and protect our health. In short, these pathogens are the invaders of our body, and the immune system is our army to protect our family. How can this army distinguish between the enemy and us? The miraculous immune army is born with the ability to recognize its own people. If it is its own already existing cells, the immune system recognizes its own people and does not make attacks. But once it encounters an unfamiliar face, such as a foreign bacterium, the advance guard will sound the alarm and draw in the brigade to drive it out or kill it. Cancer cells are also different from normal cells. Cancer cells often have special proteins on their surface that normal cells will not have, and once encountered, the immune system can recognize that this is not its own cell and begin to attack. But unfortunately, our immune system is far more capable of recognizing and attacking bacteria or viruses than cancer cells. Cancer cells are much more cunning than foreign bacteria or viruses. They are less distinctive and more like a traitor to our cellular army, so it is easy for the immune system to distinguish the enemy from us and dare not attack them. In some cases, even if the traitor is found, the army that can be summoned is too small or too weak to fight against cancer cells. Therefore, our own immunity has limited ability to suppress cancer cells and most of the time is powerless. This is why people with normal immune systems still get cancer. To use the immune system to attack cancer cells, the immune system has to be taught to recognize which one is a cancer cell, and after recognizing it, it has to strengthen the immune attack to take out the hidden traitor. This is exactly what researchers in various countries are currently working on. What are the immunotherapies available at this stage? One is to strengthen the attack on cancer cells by stimulating our own immune system, or to train the immune system to specifically attack specific parts of the tumor. Another is to synthesize certain immune components, such as anti-cancer antibodies, and then inject them into the bloodstream. These components either attack the cancer cells by activating the immune response, or simply attack the specific parts of the cancer cells, so that the cancer cells cannot grow and end up dead. Proven therapies These are the main types of immunotherapies that have been used clinically and proven to be effective: Monoclonal antibodies: These are synthetic antibodies that are specific to cancer cells. These antibodies can be designed to be very precise because they are synthesized specifically to target cancer cells, and therefore are very powerful against cancer. The advantages are high specificity and few side effects. There are also many disadvantages, such as the need for repeated injections, expensive because of the difficulty of synthesis, inability to enter inside cancer cells, the need to use large amounts, short duration of action, triggering adverse immune reactions or toxicity, etc. Cancer vaccines: Vaccines are familiar to everyone and are usually used to prevent viral and bacterial infections. However, some synthetic vaccines can activate an immune response against cancer cells in the body, so they are also used as a means of cancer prevention or immunotherapy. Immune checkpoint inhibitors: There are substances in the body called immune checkpoints, also known as the body’s immune brake. It serves as a way to tell the immune system to stop attacking normal cells. Crafty cancer cells will use this checkpoint to escape the immune attack. Therefore, the use of inhibitors of this checkpoint substance can also play an anti-cancer role. Cytokines: Cytokines are a class of substances that activate a non-specific immune response. By using them, the immune response can be enhanced and serve to attack cancer cells. Non-specific immunotherapy: This means is a generalized way to boost the body’s immune capacity so as to attack cancer cells. Obviously, the specificity is very poor and the effect is not too good. If not, the immunity may be too strong and lead to autoimmune diseases. There are also some immunotherapies that are in the experimental stage. For example, in vitro culture of lymphocytes (LAK cells) that specifically attack cancer cells. When these LAK cells are cultured and matured in a test tube and then infused back into the body, they attack the cancer cells powerfully and achieve good results. This clinical trial has recently achieved impressive results in the United States, but unfortunately, it is still in the experimental stage and is still far from being approved for large-scale clinical use. The other type is called tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes (TILs). These are special lymphocytes that are found inside the tumor. After they are isolated from the tumor, they are activated in vitro with special factors to divide and multiply in large numbers, and then infused back into the body, these cells become a special force to attack cancer cells. The results of this therapy in preliminary trials are encouraging, but unfortunately it is still in the experimental stage and too early to be clinical. Drugs with proven efficacy So what immunotherapies have been approved by authorities, such as the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), and have proven efficacy in clinical trials to date? Let’s start with anti-cancer monoclonal antibodies. The anti-cancer antibodies currently approved for clinical use are: 1. Tuximab (rituximab), which is the first anti-cancer antibody approved for lymphoma and chronic lymphocytic leukemia. 2. Alemtuzumab, also used in chronic lymphocytic leukemia. 3.Bevacizumab (Bevacizumab), used to treat lung cancer, metastatic colorectal cancer, kidney cancer and brain tumors. 4.Brentuximab?Vedotin antibody for the treatment of recurrent Hodgkin’s lymphoma and metaplastic large cell lymphoma. 5.Cetuximab, used to treat colorectal cancer, head and neck skin cancer. 6.Gituzumab (Gemtuzumab), used to treat acute granulocytic leukemia. 7.Tilimumab (Ibritumomab), used for the treatment of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. 8.Iprimizumab (Ipilimumab) for the treatment of melanoma metastasis. 9.Anti-CD20 monoclonal antibody (Ofatumumab) for the treatment of chronic lymphocytic leukemia in adults 10.Panitumumab (Panitumumab) for the treatment of metastatic colorectal cancer 11.Tositumomab, for non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma where chemotherapy is not effective. 12. Herceptin, or trastuzumab (Trastuzumab), is used to treat breast cancer. 13. Pertuzumab, also used to treat breast cancer. There is only one anti-cancer vaccine approved for clinical use, Provenge, which was approved in 2010 for the treatment of prostate cancer. There are three vaccines for cancer prevention: human papillomavirus vaccine, hepatitis A vaccine and hepatitis B vaccine. Unfortunately, the former has not yet been approved in mainland China. In addition, there are some non-specific immune drugs. The most commonly used of these are Interferon and Interleukin, a molecule that interferes with the immune system, but their limited efficacy and side effects make it difficult for them to become mainstream therapeutic measures. These are the immunotherapies for cancer that have proven their efficacy through rigorous clinical trials. How to Identify Scams The regulatory confusion in the domestic pharmaceutical market has caused many hospitals to take so-called new inventions and creations that are still in the experimental stage in laboratories for clinical treatment and profit from them. This is not only against medical guidelines, but also may bring heavy financial burden to cancer patients and even delay regular and effective treatment. Therefore, please remember that any hospital that claims to have a new invention in our institution or a new immune or biological therapy that is unique in the country is a fraud. That some research institutions do have some new immunotherapy creation inventions, and the patient belongs to other therapies that are not effective, is it not better to receive this new biological treatment than to give up and wait for death? In a normal, strictly regulated medical society, such a trial stage attempt is not allowed to be charged as a clinical treatment for the patient. This is known in medical terms as a clinical trial. Patients who voluntarily participate in a trial need to be informed in advance that it is a trial, and that they cannot be charged for the treatment, except for some necessary expenses for materials. The nature of the charge and the nature of the prior notification are very different. So how do you know which cancer immunotherapy treatments are legitimate and approved, and which are scams? In addition to looking at the approved immunotherapies I listed above, there are a few easy ways to identify them: 1. Medical scams often claim to be unique. Normal medical treatment would not be like this. A new cancer treatment or drug is the result of years of time-consuming research involving many people. Almost no one in modern medicine has ever made a new medical breakthrough on his or her own, let alone a complex biological cancer treatment. To take a step back, even if a genius invents a new treatment on his own, it still needs to be published in academic journals and then taken to other medical institutions for repeated validation to ensure that the results are not due to personal bias. 2. Medical charlatans always complain that he has a unique secret, but other pharmaceutical companies or the mainstream medical community suppress them to protect their interests. This can’t happen in the medical world nowadays. Hearing this is the same as hearing “I am a liar”. 3. Miracle cures. If it doesn’t sound like it’s true, it probably isn’t. Although there are many types of immunotherapy mentioned above, unfortunately, so far, the results are not very good. If any hospital or individual boasts that his new biological therapy has an amazingly high cure rate, and no other institution has repeatedly verified it, then it is almost certainly a fraud. 4.Take individual cases to say something. Every patient’s condition is different, and the human body responds differently to treatment. Just because someone has achieved good results does not mean that the therapy must be effective. Behind a patient who comes out and proves effective, there may be hundreds or thousands of patients who are not. To prove that a new treatment works, it takes years of clinical trials involving hundreds or thousands of people. Beyond that, it’s all a scam.