Immunotherapy shows promise in breast cancer

There was big news at the annual meeting of the European Society for Medical Oncology in Munich over the weekend — but there's significant debate over its meaning. At issue are new clinical data in which women with advanced triple-negative breast cancer were treated with a Roche checkpoint inhibitor called Tecentriq plus chemotherapy. Those given the treatment went two months longer on average without their cancer worsening compared with those on chemo alone.

But the effect was seen only in patients with a marker called PD-L1 on their cancer cells. And as promising as it was to see any hope in immunotherapy for breast cancer, some observers raised are raising questions about the modest benefit of the treatment when side effects and cost are taken into consideration. (Tecentriq runs $12,500 per month.)

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