Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Breakthrough Discovery IDs How Air Pollution Causes Lung Cancer
Financial Times: Scientists Discover How Air Pollution Causes Lung Cancer
An international team of scientists has made a breakthrough in identifying how air pollution causes lung cancer in people who have never smoked, a development that could help medical experts prevent and treat tumors. Researchers found the fine particles in polluted air cause inflammation in the lungs, which activates pre-existing cancer genes that had been dormant. It was previously believed that air pollution triggered genetic mutations that lead to cancer. (Cookson, 9/10)
Al Jazeera: Scientists Discover How Air Pollution Causes Lung Cancer
Scientists say they have identified the mechanism through which air pollution triggers lung cancer in non-smokers, a discovery one expert hailed as “an important step for science – and for society." (9/10)
BBC News: Air Pollution Cancer Breakthrough Will Rewrite The Rules
The team at the Francis Crick Institute in London showed that rather than causing damage, air pollution was waking up old damaged cells. One of the world's leading experts, Prof Charles Swanton, said the breakthrough marked a "new era." And it may now be possible to develop drugs that stop cancers forming. (Gallagher, 9/10)
How polluted is your state? —
The Hill: The 10 Most Polluted States In The US
How clean are the air and water in your state? Using 2021 data, U.S. News and World Reports’ feature on the “Best States” has ranked U.S. states on several metrics, including economics, education and health care. The listing also measures natural environment, which is based on a state’s air/water quality and pollution levels. Pollution was determined based on air and water emissions from industry and utilities, and overall measures to long-term human health effects, using information from the Environmental Protection Agency. (Falcon and Nexstar Media Wire, 9/10)
In other cancer research —
USA Today: Immunotherapy Offers Long-Term Survival For Some Lung Cancer Patients
Patients with advanced lung cancer had a better chance at survival when their treatment combined chemotherapy with a drug designed to turn the immune system against cancer, according to two studies released Sunday at a conference in Paris, France. In both trials, 20% of participants who took chemotherapy plus the drug Keytruda, from Merck, survived for at least five years after their diagnosis. That's twice as long as is typical for advanced lung cancer patients. (Weintraub, 9/11)
NBC News: New Cell-Based Therapy For Melanoma More Effective Than Existing Treatment, Trial Finds
European researchers announced Saturday that a new treatment for advanced melanoma was more effective than the leading existing therapy in a Phase 3 clinical trial. The treatment, which uses a patient’s own immune cells to fight the cancer, has some similarities to another type of treatment that has proven to be highly effective for blood cancers, called CAR-T therapy. (Sullivan, 9/10)
Stat: Cancer Treatment Devised In 1980s Is Newly Proved Effective
Eight years ago, a Dutch oncologist, John Haanen, set out to change melanoma treatment by arranging one of the largest and most rigorous trials ever for a cell therapy technique originally devised in the mid-’80s. He could not have picked worse timing. (Mast, 9/10)
