"A drug prescribed for one of the commonest forms of leukaemia has reduced the deadly cancer to a chronic illness that can be managed with a single pill a day, specialists said yesterday.
New data issued in London showed that about 90 per cent of patients with chronic myeloid leukaemia (CML) who take the drug Glivec are alive and well after five years.
Before the drug was developed, the blood cancer would become advanced within four to six years, giving little hope of survival.
Specialists described the results as "breathtaking". They said that, unlike some cancer drugs which had shown early promise that then faded, Glivec patients had an "impressively durable response to the drug..."
"The significant success of Glivec in treating CML is an exciting model for the development of new treatments for other cancers."
(Source: Telegraph.co.uk)
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