The art of war, unleashing the immune system to fight cancer

Cancer is a complex, multifactorial disease that not only is a cause of major human suffering throughout history, but continues to represent an enormous burden to society. In most cases long term treatment remains elusive primarily because the underlying cause does not often lie in a single defect but rather large number of small effects arising from lifestyle, environment and underlying genetic predispositions. Recent advances in our understanding of the human immune system and cancer immune evasion have led to nothing less than a revolution in cancer treatment. The development of effective immune checkpoint inhibitors, and novel cell therapy strategies have resulted unprecedented responses across a number indications with dramatic increases in durable disease control and long term survival. We will discuss the evolution of our view of the immune system and highlight the breakthroughs which provide a framework to develop the next generation of cancer therapeutics