新抗癌疗法对黑色素瘤疗效显著，但价格近30万美元

    本文为与《时代》杂志的合作内容。原文最初发表于Time.com。

    一项最新研究显示，协同使用两种抗癌药物，可以使将近60%的晚期黑色素瘤患者的肿瘤缩小。

    这项试验招募了全球137个地点的945名病人。BBC引述几位英国医生本周在美国临床肿瘤学会年度大会上的发言称，当联合使用ipilimumab和nivolumab两种药物治疗黑色素瘤时，超过半数患者的肿瘤停止恶化了近一年之久。该研究也被刊登在了《新英格兰医学期刊》上。

    这两款药物的设计宗旨都是调动人体自然防御功能，以对抗癌症。人体的免疫系统本身就是一款对抗疾病的良药，但有些先天的抑制因素会像刹车一样，阻止身体攻击自己的组织。癌细胞正是利用这个漏洞无法抑制地持续增长。这两款药物的作用就是关掉人体的这些“刹车”。

    这两款药物都是由百时美施贵宝公司研发的。据BBC报道，另一款名叫Pembrolizumab的新药也有类似的效果。

    研究人员发现，58%的患者在同时使用了这两款药物之后，他们的肿瘤在一年内至少缩小了三分之一。但目前还不清楚患者接受了这两款药物治疗后的生存时间是多久。

    皮肤癌是人类最常见的癌症之一。美国癌症协会表示，虽然黑色素瘤的发病率只占所有皮肤癌患者的2%，但它却是一种极其凶险的疾病，多数皮肤癌患者的死亡都是由它造成的。据美国癌症协会预测，2015年美国将有近1万人死于皮肤癌。

    不过，在美国临床肿瘤学会年度大会上，这个利好消息被另一个高调的演讲遮掩住了。该演讲痛批癌症治疗的天价，当然它并非只针对百时美施贵宝公司的这两款抗黑色素瘤药物，而是针对整个癌症治疗业。

    据《华尔街日报》报道，斯隆凯特琳癌症研究中心（Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center）消化肿瘤科负责人莱纳德•索尔茨在大会上发表演讲称，如果用这种“双药联合”的方法治疗病人，那么每人每年的医疗成本将达到29.5万美元左右，他表示这个价格是病人难以承受的。

    索尔茨还指出，如果美国所有的转移性肿瘤患者每年都花29.5万美元看病，那么仅仅一年的治疗费用总额就将高达1740亿美元。

    “癌症药物令人难以承受的高价是一个大问题，也是我们的问题。”索尔茨表示。

    索尔茨医生还呼吁改变美国药品的定价方式。他表示，联邦医疗保险系统应该直接与制药公司进行谈判，不过法律现在还不允许这样做。（财富中文网）

    译者：朴成奎

    审校：任文科

    This article is published in partnership with Time.com. The original version can be found here.

    Two cancer drugs, when taken in concert, can shrink tumors in nearly 60% of people with advanced-stage melanoma, according to a new study.

    The trial, which enrolled 945 patients at 137 sites worldwide, found that treating the cancer with medications ipilimumab and nivolumab stopped its advance for almost a year in more than half of cases, the BBC reports, citing a presentation by U.K. doctors this weekend at the American Society of Clinical Oncology annual conference. The research was also published in the New England Journal of Medicine.

    Both drugs are designed to bring the body’s natural defenses in on the fight against the cancer. While the immune system is generally a potent agent in combatting disease, certain built-in “brakes” keep the body from attacking its own tissue — a loophole that cancers can use to continue growing unchecked. But both medications turn those “brakes” off.

    Both drugs are developed by Bristol-Myers Squibb Inc. BMY 2.91% . Another drug, Pembrolizumab, developed by Merck & Co. Inc. MRK -0.23% is reported to have similar qualitiese, according to the BBC.

    In the study, 58% of patients taking both medicines saw their tumours shrink by at least a third over the course of almost a year. Still, perhaps the most important information — how long patients treated with the two medications live — is unknown, and will remain so for some time.

    Skin cancer is among the most common cancers; according to the American Cancer Society (ACS), while melanoma accounts for less than 2% of skin cancers, it causes the majority of skin cancer deaths. The ACS predicts that nearly 10,000 Americans will die of skin cancer in 2015.

    However, the upbeat news was overshadowed at the conference by a high-profile speech condemning the skyrocketing price, not just of BMS’s melanoma-focused drugs, but cancer treatments in general.

    The Wall Street Journal reported Leonard Saltz, chief of gastrointestinal oncology at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, as telling the conference in a speech that the cost of treating one patient with the two-drug combination would be around $295,000 over nearly one year, something he called unsustainable.

    If all U.S. patients with metastatic cancer took drugs priced at $295,000 a year, it would cost $174 billion to treat them all for just one year, the WSJ reported Dr. Saltz as saying.

    “The unsustainably high prices of cancer drugs is a big problem, and it’s our problem,” Dr. Saltz said.

    Dr. Saltz called for an overhaul of the way drugs are priced in the U.S., saying that Medicare should be able to negotiate with pharma companies directly, something currently not allowed by law.