An all-pill combination buys precious months against the most common advanced breast cancer

For people whose advanced breast cancer has learned to resist standard hormone treatments, a phase 3 trial brings real news: an all-oral combination built around a new drug, giredestrant, kept the cancer from progressing for a median of 8.8 months, compared with 5.5 months on standard care. In patients whose tumours carried a particular resistance mutation, the gain was larger still — 10 months versus 5.5. The 373-patient study, led by Erica Mayer at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, was published in the New England Journal of Medicine.

SDG 3 · Good health and well-being — Mechanism: tech innovation