Lots of opinions to take for a test drive. The Azer technology...

Lots of opinions to take for a test drive. The Azer technology fits hand in glove with a strategy to kill cancers that either express CD19 or are made to express CD 19 (Enter CF 33 with CD 19 coding gene). I doubt that IMU have liquid cancers as their top priority. Rather if they prove CF 33 is safe, then irrespective of stand alone naked CF33 efficacy, all they need is Azer to kill the cancers infected with CF 33. That would be game set and match for CF 33/Azer combo for all solid tumours. Perhaps the FDA would see that CF33 is safe, see that Azer is safe and effective, and not require oncarlytics to start from scratch, ie CF33 is seen by the FDA as just a safe vector, not a therapy. Any naked CF 33 tumour busting would be a bonus.

The one aspect of naked CF33 that could be improved is knocking out apoptosis inhibitor genes that remain in the CF 33 genome (there’s 6 of them). Such genes would never be knocked out using the YF game of thrones approach because vaccinia strains are always going to prefer to assist cancer cells to divide to generate more host cells. (And that is why keytruda will prove to be a dead end - vaccinia will block the apoptosis trigger). Alas a new version of CF 33 would send IMU back to the starting blocks so it’s never going to happen. The point is that I speculate that CF33 is indeed infecting cells as they did in mice as eluded to by YF but if efficacy isn’t there, then the Azer approach might be a master stroke.

I’m staying in and also take this chance to smile at the cheer leaders who spat their vitriol at anyone with a more considered approach. Don’t fret, blue skies on the horizon.

Not financial advice.