Onco Actu du 4 octobre 2016

	1. Biologie
Nobel Prize 2016: What Ohsumi’s discovery of cellular ‘self-eating’ means for cancer [Cancer Research UK] Cancer cells are constantly adapting to survive and keep growing. And in recent years it’s been shown that autophagy plays a key role in how cancer cells do this – and how they use it to resist treatment.
Yoshinori Ohsumi of Japan Wins Nobel Prize in Medicine [NY Times] Kay F. Macleod, a cancer researcher at the University of Chicago, said, “It is super exciting that autophagy has been recognized in and of itself.” Even more so, she added, because Dr. Ohsumi’s work was basic research.
	5.2 Pharma
US FDA grants Breakthrough Therapy Designation for Roche's Alecensa (alectinib) for first-line treatment of people with ALK-positive NSCLC [Roche] This second Alecensa Breakthrough Therapy Designation granted is based on phase 3 J-ALEX study.
Samsung Bioepis seeks Europe approval for copy of Herceptin breast cancer drug [Reuters] Interest in biosimilars has soared in recent years as copies of some of the world's best-selling medicines have hit the market at big discounts. Bioepis said it submitted the Herceptin biosimilar application - its first copy of a cancer drug to be submitted for regulatory approval in Europe - in August.
Roche say cancer drug Alecensa gets breakthrough therapy designation [Reuters] Roche said on Tuesday its lung cancer drug Alecensa (alectinib), developed by its Genentech unit, received a second breakthrough therapy designation (BTD) from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for its anaplastic lymphoma kinase (ALK) inhibitor.
	5.2.3 Pharma - économie
Still Stuck Below IPO Price, Merrimack Restructures, CEO Resigns [Xconomy] In the four years since going public, Merrimack Pharmaceuticals has brought its first drug to market, a treatment for pancreatic cancer. But disappointing sales, mounting losses, and a sagging share price have triggered sweeping changes at the Cambridge, MA, company.
	5.4 Traitements - Economie
Panel releases best practices in cost-effectiveness analysis [PhRMA] Several of the panel’s recommendations, developed by academic thought leaders in the field of CEA, echo positions in PhRMA’s Principles for Value Assessment Frameworks released earlier this year.
NICE recommends new drug osimertinib for hundreds of people with lung cancer [NICE] In trials almost twice as many patients responded to osimertinib compared with another chemotherapy treatment. It also stalled cancer progression by an extra four months. Around 300 patients will be eligible for treatment with osimertinib every year in England and Wales.
ICER on PD-1 Immunotherapies to Treat Lung Cancer: Lower the Prices [RAPS] ICER estimates that the cost effectiveness for PD-1 immunotherapies were $219,179 per quality-adjusted life year (QALY) gained for Roche's cancer immunotherapy Tecentriq (atezolizumab) (note that atezolizumab has not yet been approved by FDA for NSCLC in the US), $240,049 for Merck’s Keytruda (pembrolizumab) and $415,950 for Bristol-Myers Squibb’s Opdivo (nivolumab).
'Breakthrough' lung cancer drug made available on NHS [The Guardian] “For the first time, we are able to give patients access to a promising new cancer treatment whilst more evidence is gathered on its effectiveness. This is the system working as it should.”
	5.6 ESMO
New Research From Bristol-Myers Squibb at ESMO 2016 Congress Reinforces Leadership in Immuno-Oncology and Differentiated Research Approach [BMS] New Opdivo data in advanced bladder cancer to be highlighted, and first presentation of overall survival with Yervoy in adjuvant melanoma.
	6.10.1 Politiques (USA)
US Zika funding shortfall will impede cancer research, health officials say [The Guardian] “We won’t be able to backfill for the cancer research we had to take from to keep things going,” said the health and human services secretary, Sylvia Burwell. “There was a reason we asked for the $1.9bn, and that was important uses of money.”
	6.11 Patients
When noncompliance is your best option [Outliving Lung Cancer] The bottom line is this—currently clinical trials are monitored as discreet events, a residual of the old one-off paradigm. No one seems to be keeping track of patients such as myself, who are traveling from trial to trial.
Dying woman picks road trip over chemotherapy [BBC News] When 90-year-old Norma Bauerschmidt was diagnosed with terminal cancer, her immediate instinct was to refuse treatment and instead find a more positive way to spend her final days.
	6.3 Associations/Fondations
Crowdsourcing effort takes aim at deadliest breast cancers [STAT] For many of the 150,000-plus patients nationwide whose tumors have spread to bones, brains, lungs or other distant organs, the hue heralding breast cancer awareness and survival each October is a little too rosy. They know cancer will likely kill them. And they’ve often felt neglected by mainstream advocacy and medical research.
	6.7 DMP, Big Data & applis
Democratic databases: science on GitHub [Nature] Scientists are turning to a software–development site to share data and code.
precisionFDA’s Next Challenge? Conduct an App-a-Thon! [FDA Voice] We are happy to announce the next challenge: an “App-a-Thon,” inviting software developers to get together with their peers, collaborators, and friends to add NGS software apps to the precisionFDA app library. Apps in this case are executable commands using the Linux operating system that are “wrapped” around NGS software.