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Published online 28 September 2006 | Nature | doi:10.1038/news060925-12
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Immune response vital in cancer fight
Activity of body's defences predicts outcome better than tumour spread.
How can you tell how bad a cancer is, and how likely the patient is to survive? New evidence suggests that the best way may sometimes be to look at how well the immune system has attacked tumours, rather than focussing on how far the tumours have spread.
It has long been known that the immune system can home in on cancerous cells and that immune cells can take up residence within tumours.
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