Cancer remission achieved after commercial use of NexCAR19, India’s first indigenous CAR-T cell therapy

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NexCAR19 has been developed by ImmunoAct, a company incubated under IIT Bombay, and Tata Memorial Hospital.
- NexCAR19 was granted market authorization by Central Drugs Standard Control Organisation (CDSCO) in 2023.
CAR-T cell therapy is a new approach in immunotherapy, where the patient’s immune system is strengthened to attack cancer cells.

It restores the ability of the T-cells to recognise the cancer cells and kill them.
- T-cells are white blood cells that recognize and fight infections and cancerous growths.
- In advanced stages, cancer cells can inactivate T-cells or modify themselves so that T-cells cannot detect them.
Therapy involves genetic engineering of T-cells by introducing Chimeric Antigen Receptors (CARs), to produce CAR T-cells.
- CARs are proteins that assist T-cells to recognise and attach to a specific protein, or antigen, present on cancer cells.

Significance of CAR-T cell therapy:
- Very effective against some types of cancer e.g. Leukemia, Lymphoma.
- Short treatment time and more rapid recovery as unlike chemotherapy, it is administered only once to a patient.
- Useful for cancers not responding to combinations of chemotherapy or other immunotherapy approaches.
- CAR T-cells are known as living drugs as T-cells persist in the body for long-term and can benefit for many years.