The eyebrow-raising hypothesis that intratumoural Complete Freund’s Adjuvant (CFA) could be used as a cancer immunotherapy was first published in the ASI journal five years ago. Since then, we have embarked on pre-clinical trials in mice, dogs and horses. Following treatment of 3 cancer patients in Switzerland, we are now part way through a Phase I clinical trial of this therapy in cancer patients at the Canberra Hospital.

We show efficacy of our therapy in a proportion of treated animals. We demonstrate safety of this therapy in both animals and in human cancer patients. We also show intratumoural immune infiltrates in 4/5 cancer patients 4 days after CFA injection; a potentially significant finding, as early tumour infiltrates in mice are predictive of extended survival.

Further exploration of this therapy, which has very low side effects, requires infrequent patient visits, and is cost-effective and simple enough to be used in both developed and developing nations, is therefore strongly warranted.