NIH Approves Liver Tumor Gene Therapy

The US National Institutes of Health's Recombinant DNA Advisory Committee has approved a gene therapy protocol for treating liver cancer sponsored by California-based Canji.

The protocol will use a sterilized version of the virus ACN53, which is frequently associated with the common cold, to deliver a normal version of the p53 gene into malignant liver tumors to investigate whether this can retard growth of or kill the tumor cells. Eligible patients will have either hepatocellular or colorectal cancer which has spread to the liver and have evidence of a defective p53 gene in the liver tumors. There was some concern from the members of the RAC on whether the investigators had sufficient preclinical toxicology data to warrant proceeding into human trials.