Could this finally be the holy grail of cancer cures? A single shot of a measles virus kills cancer?

It was for one woman with myeloma who had run out of treatment options. She went into complete remission for nine months.

From Tumors All Over to Complete Remission

How did this happen? She got a huge dose of an engineered measles virus that targets myeloma cells, according to a Mayo Clinic press release. That’s it. Just one dose caused her tumors to shrink and disappear.

Of course, it wasn’t really as simple as all that. The treatment came with some pretty nasty side effects. She had a headache, spiked a 105 fever and was vomiting, among other things.

But she probably considers it worth the temporary misery. It took a few weeks, but the tumors all over her body disappeared.

Reason for Hope, But No Guarantees

As amazing as this news is, it’s not time to sound the death knell for cancers everywhere just yet.

This study included only two people. And only one saw her tumors disappear. A second woman had positive initial results, but her cancer started growing again.

So is this a miracle cure? Maybe someday. But a lot more work needs to be done.

A few things to keep in mind:

• We need more clinical trials to show it’s safe.
• We need even more (and bigger) trials to show that it can work in more than two people. And hopefully cause remission in more than one.
• This treatment is specific to myeloma. The measles virus was engineered to infect those specific cancer cells. For similar treatments to work on other cancers, viruses (not necessarily measles) would need to be engineered to target those cancers.

Also, the treatment may not work as well (or at all), if you have antibodies against the virus used in the treatment (in this case measles). Your body might kill them before they have a chance to kill the cancer. Researchers will have to look at this more closely, too.

What’s Next

More trials, of course. The Mayo Clinic plans to start a larger trial later this year.

If you might be interested in participating in this trial, you can contact the Mayo Clinic for more information.

Learn More

This story has been widely reported since the Mayo Clinic published its news release on April 14, 2014. If you’re interested in learning more we have some sources listed below the video.

But first, check out what the Mayo Clinic’s Stephen Russell has to say about this treatment:

Additional reading:

Could measles cure cancer? Uh, not exactly… – This is a great article from Cancer Research UK, explaining in plain language what the scientists did and why it’s nowhere near ready for prime time.

Measles virus used to treat bone marrow cancer – Another easy to understand explanation of what the researchers did and how they interpreted what happened.

Remission of Disseminated Cancer After Systemic Oncolytic Virotherapy – Warning: this is a rather technical article in Mayo Clinic Proceedings