June 2020

As I recall the early days of the HIV/AIDS pandemic, what stands out most is its profound human cost and the courage of those who helped our society transcend it. We are in the midst of a time in which the human toll of COVID-19 and the enormity of the path ahead are clear.

References: Humility and Hope: Evolution of the HIV Pandemic, From ART to Today’s Cancer Cures

The connections between cancer and HIV/AIDS became clear relatively early in the HIV/AIDS pandemic and continue to this day. Not only were opportunistic infections present in a majority of HIV-infected patients who met the initial diagnostic criteria for AIDS, but several cancer types were far more prevalent as well. While there is still much to understand before HIV is fully conquered, we have already learned a great deal about the pathobiology of this virus that has helped advanced immune-oncological technologies and led to the development of increasingly effective gene therapy delivery systems.

Coverage from virtual meetings of the American Association of Cancer Research, the Academy of Managed Care Pharmacy, and the International Society for Pharmacoeconomics and Outcomes Research.

Coverage from the Community Oncology Alliance Virtual Meeting, held April 23-24, 2020.

We need the development of new, complex biomarkers to address the increasing complexity in treatment modalities that, in and of themselves, have characteristics of a continuous variable; they require innovation and outcomes data, which perhaps will be partly addressed by some of the emerging real-world evidence databases amassed by pairing sequence information and clinical outcomes. Tumor mutational burden is a great example of this innovation in practice.

The American Society of Clinical Oncology recommends that cancer survivors who have completed their treatment and are under surveillance with no known evidence of disease are to be kept out of care facilities to avoid developing COVID-19.

Known as a gene therapy pioneer, Zaia has spent almost 40 years at City of Hope, in Duarte, California. He was first drawn by the promise of studying cytomegalovirus. Over the decades, his groundbreaking research has encompassed HIV/AIDS, cellular gene transfer therapy, immunotherapy, bispecific antibodies, and now hyperimmune globulin for workers on the frontlines of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic.