Beata Halassy, a virologist from the University of Zagreb, has successfully treated herself with breast cancer using a virus she developed herself in the laboratory. A cancerous tumor was found in her breast in 2020 and after doing experiments on herself she now says she has been completely cancer free for four years.
Halassy's research paper has been published in a medical journal and is now sparking debate about the ethics of a scientist doing self-medication. Halassy decided to do oncolytic virotherapy (OVT) on his stage 3 cancer because this treatment is still in the testing stage and is only given to metastatic melanoma cancer patients in the United States.
Using his own expertise, Halassy conducted a trial of OVT treatment in breast cancer. This treatment uses a virus that is injected directly into the cancer tumor. This virus will then attack the tumor cells and at the same time encourage the body's immune system to attack the virus and cancer cells in the body. The two viruses he used in this experiment were measles and vesicular stomatitis.
The virus, which was cultured itself in the laboratory, was injected directly into the tumor with the help of a colleague for two months and was monitored by an oncologist. This experimental treatment effectively causes the tumor to shrink before detaching from the pectoral muscles and skin which is then removed through a surgical procedure. When the tumor was examined, it was filled with immune cells of the body's lymphocytes indicating the effectiveness of OVT treatment for breast cancer.
Halassy took this drastic step full of controversy because this is the third time a breast cancer tumor has been detected on her body. Although his self-treatment was effective, he was aware of the issue of medical ethics doing experiments on his own body even though he was an expert in the field of virology.
Scientists doing experiments on their own bodies is not a new phenomenon. Robin Warren in 1982 swallowed the bacteria Helicobacter pylori himself to confirm the hypothesis that it is the cause of stomach ulcers.