Cancer Drug Could Cure Eye Disease


The commonly used cancer drug Avastin could be used to treat older people with age-related macular degeneration, researchers claim. Specialists at London’s Moorfields Eye Hospital have found that using the popular cancer drug dramatically improved the eyesight of older patients with the progressive eye disease. Experts are now calling for the cancer drug to be licensed as a treatment for macular degeneration.

Avastin stops the body from producing a protein that encourages the growth of new blood vessels. Inhibiting this protein stops the rapid growth of cancerous tumours in the body, and also counters macular degeneration - a potentially blinding eye disease caused by abnormal blood vessels forming in the eyes of elderly people.

Eye-care experts at Moorfields found that using Avastin injections to treat people with macular degeneration proved just as effective as using Lucentis - the drug currently prescribed to treat the eye problem. However, researchers believe that a course of Avastin injections could cost up to 96% less than a round of Lucentis injections.

The British Medical Journal has recommended that the drug should be used in countries too poor to offer Lucentis. The drug has not yet been officially cleared as a treatment for eye diseases and manufacturer, Roche has explained that it would prefer to focus on the drugs anti-cancer capabilities. However, the news has not dampened the enthusiasm of researchers who claim that the drug could be used to safeguard the vision of millions of elderly people succumbing to the blinding eye condition.

11th June 2010

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