938: T-Cells

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T-Cells

Title text: 'We're not sure how to wipe out the chimeral T-cells after they've destroyed the cancer. Though I do have this vial of smallpox ...'

Explanation

Jeff's explanation:

This is another cancer and leukemia related comic, in this comic, two characters are having a discussion about a new trial treatment. A trial is a treatment that is not yet passed all of the hurdles to become an official drug or treatment, but it available to a certain set of patients based on the pharma company's set of criteria.

In this case, the two characters are talking about a trial in which the doctors take cells out of the patients body and treat it with specific code to attack the cancer. However, to make the cell replicate fast enough to match the replication of the cancer cells, they have treated the cells with HIV. HIV is Human Immunodeficiency Virus, which is the precursor to AIDS.

Basically, this treatment seems to replace one terrible disease with another terrible disease. As the image text says, they don't know how to get rid of the HIV cells after they remove the cancer. And the last part of the image text is a joke, in which the doctor suggests yet another disease to inject into the patients body.

Transcript

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Discussion

Does anyone have a link to the actual article? Or possibly a proper citation? 192.17.144.82 (talk) (please sign your comments with ~~~~)

I have added such a link in the explanation. Unfortunately, you have to subscribe to the magazine asterisked in the comic, so the link goes to another one. It also helps to Google "nejm aug 10 2011". Anonymous 04:51, 13 December 2013 (UTC)

Trial appears to have been a success, although the patient now has no B-cells and thus a compromised immune system (will need regular gamma globulin transfusions and the like). 75.103.23.206 16:54, 13 December 2012 (UTC)

Looks to be this article here [1] and [2]. I'll stick with chemo, thanks. 173.245.54.87 16:36, 24 November 2013 (UTC)

I know it's a joke, but just in case people are taking this seriously, this is worth a read. [3] The key word should have been "lentivirus", not "HIV". The T cells were modified using a heavily altered lentivirus derived from HIV. The virus shouldn't be referred to as HIV, though it makes for some great headlines. 199.27.128.167 20:40, 2 December 2013 (UTC)

Before WWII there was an succesful method of curing syphilis with malaria (malariotherapy). Maybe a reference141.101.96.217 11:32, 27 March 2014 (UTC)

Interesting. I had heard a "story" some time ago that disease brought to higher latitudes from newly discovered tropical countries laid waste to myriads due to the fact that the climate was cooler. Maybe it was related to the lack of suitable pathogens in the communities.

I used Google News BEFORE it was clickbait (talk) 13:09, 23 January 2015 (UTC)

Isn't "HIV virus" redundant? 108.162.245.42 02:24, 28 September 2014 (UTC)

Yes, yes it is. Anonymous 20:25, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

Removed the incomplete thingy because I fixed the explanation. Put it back if there are more questionsXFez (talk) 13:32, 21 February 2017 (UTC)

I don't think it's a reference to the little old lady who swallowed a fly - I think it's a reference to the use of introducing invasive species as pest control (like cane toads) and how you might try to control that invasive species by introducing their natural predator 141.101.99.150 06:49, 23 September 2021 (UTC)