Antibiotics affect the efficacy of immunotherapy

A study published in the journal Science by a research team from Gustave Roussy, INSERM, INRA, AP-HP, IHU Médiaterranée Infections* and Paris-Sud University shows that prescribed antibiotics impair the efficacy of immunotherapy in cancer patients. It is important to consider that more than 20% of patients living with cancer receive antibiotics. The authors explored patients' gut microbiota composition by metagenomic analysis and demonstrated that the bacterium Akkermansia muciniphila was associated with a better clinical response to anti-PD-1 antibody immunotherapy. Moreover, oral administration of this bacterium to mice with an unfavorable microbiota restored the anti-tumor activity of the immunotherapy. This paper will be published online by the journal Science on Thursday, 2 November 2017. Immunotherapy represents a real revolution in cancer therapies and has been shown to be superior to standard chemotherapy in advanced melanoma, lung, renal and bladder cancer. Although a large proportion of patients still do not benefit from this treatment, " Our research partially explains why some patients do not respond.