CANCER
A panel of experts advised the FDA to approve a blood test for colon cancer
Courtesy Guardant Health
An independent panel of advisers to the Food and Drug Administration yesterday recommended the agency approve a blood-based colon cancer detection test made by Guardant Health. In a prospective study of 20,000 participants, the test detected 100% of colon cancers at stage 2 or later.
The test is still less sensitive than a colonoscopy: It detects 65% of stage 1 cancers, and just 13% of precancerous polyps. But a blood-based test would be more convenient than a colonoscopy, which could encourage more patients to keep up with screening. Currently, a third of patients fall behind on recommended screening, which contributes to the majority of colon cancer deaths, report STAT's Angus Chen and Jonathan Wosen. More here.
global health
Existing measures could prevent up to 750,000 deaths due to antimicrobial resistance a year
Antimicrobial resistance is a huge threat, linked with 5 million deaths a year globally. Yesterday, we wrote about ways to cut down on those infections in health care settings in the U.S. But simple interventions such as broader vaccination campaigns, improved sanitation, and better hospital infection control could save as many as 750,000 lives a year in low- and middle-income countries, according to a new series published on Thursday in the Lancet.
Greater global access to new antibiotics would also help reduce the overall death toll of bacterial disease, which kills 8 million a year and is especially dangerous for newborns in countries with limited health care resources. But for long-term gains, preventing infections is key, lowering the chances for the bugs to evolve resistance, "so that the drugs will work when they are most needed," wrote co-author Joseph Lewnard, an epidemiologist at the University of California, Berkeley.
VACCINES
Why don't more people get vaccinated against HPV?
Human papillomavirus vaccines work — for women and men. A large dataset released yesterday ahead of the American Society of Clinical Oncology's annual meeting showed that in a cohort of 1.7 million patients, vaccinated men had 3.4 cases of HPV-caused cancer per 100,000 patients, compared to 7.5 cases per 100,000 in unvaccinated men. For vaccinated female patients, the incidence was 11.5 per 100,000 patients, compared to 15.8 per 100,000 unvaccinated women.
Yet rates of HPV vaccination in men remain very low. Vaccination in male adolescents and young adults in the U.S. improved from 7.8% to 36.4% between 2011 and 2020. But that means a majority of men are still missing out on a lifesaving vaccine, reports my colleague Matt Herper — and so are a majority of women. Though female vaccination rates went up from 37.7% to 49.4% in the same period, they are still far below the 90% goal established by the WHO. More here.
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