Immunotherapy plus chemotherapy as first-line treatment choice for advanced disease without oncogene mutations, irrespective of ethnicity and PD-L1 status 

The ESMO Award for Immuno-Oncology 2021 is given to Prof. Wolf H. Fridman, whose research has made significant contributions to unveiling the prognostic and predictive role of the tumour microenvironment 

For the recipient of the ESMO Award for Immuno-Oncology 2020, Dr Jedd Wolchok, one of the biggest challenges in the field is knowing how and when to de-escalate immunotherapy 

Data from SECOMBIT provide useful insights to the optimal sequence of immune checkpoint inhibitor therapy and targeted treatment combinations for patients with BRAF-mutated, advanced melanoma 

Too often the access to quality biomarkers is undermined by poor knowledge on the need for quality assurance. Relying on the assumption that biomarkers bring ‘innovation’ without claiming quality may be appealing to some, perhaps not really to medical conservatives – and not to patients, for sure. 

Survival benefit with first-line pembrolizumab plus chemotherapy in persistent, recurrent or metastatic cervical cancer

Immune chemo-sensitisation results show potential for this approach in the treatment of advanced CRC, but greater understanding of response characteristics is required in future clinical trials

The ESMO Congress 2021 has started today with three sessions on developmental therapeutics, including immunotherapy. The overarching theme in these sessions is the improvement of checkpoint inhibitor-based immunotherapy and a new flavour of synthetic lethality in molecularly pre-defined solid tumours.