WORLD / World Reaction
US offers China briefings on missile defence
(Agencies)
Updated: 2007-06-04 13:02
SINGAPORE - US Defence Se
WORLD / Health
Study: Liver cancer breakthrough found
(AP)
Updated: 2007-06-04 13:34
CHICAGO - For the first time, doctors say they have found a pill that
improves survival in liver cancer, a notoriously hard to treat disease
diagnosed in more than half a million people globally each year.
The results in a multinational study of 602 patients with advanced liver
cancer are impressive and likely will change the way patients are
treated, cancer specialists including the study authors say.
Patients got either two tablets daily of a drug called sorafenib or dummy
pills in the study, which started in March 2005. Some patients are still
alive, although on average, sorafenib patients survived 10.7 months
versus almost 8 months for those on dummy pills.
That type of survival advantage "has never happened" with liver cancer
"and is a major breakthrough in the management of the disease," said Dr.
Josep Llovet, the lead author.
"That may not sound like a lot of time," but for liver cancer, "this is
actually a quite impressive gain," said Dr. Nancy Davidson of Johns
Hopkins' Bloomberg School of Public Health. "It is the first effective
systemic treatment for liver cancer, which is such a huge problem
internationally."
Sorafenib attacks cancer with a targeted double-barreled approach. It
zeros in on malignant cells themselves and cuts off the blood supply
feeding the tumor. It is believed to work on tumors within the liver and
those that have spread elsewhere.
In the study, tumors didn't shrink or disappear but in many cases they
also didn't grow.
"You are not curing the disease but you are delaying the progression of
the disease significantly and strikingly," said Llovet, of Mount Sinai
School of Medicine in New York and Hospital Clinic of Barcelona, Spain.
The study was halted early, in February, because of the good results, and
patients on dummy pills were switched to sorafenib.
"This is a very good step forward in this disease," said Dr. Emily Chan
of Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center in Nashville, Tenn.
Results were prepared for release Monday in Chicago at the American
Society of Clinical Oncology's annual meeting.
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cretary Robert Gates on Sunday offered China
briefings on the US missile defence system to reassure them that it does
not threaten China's nuclear deterrent.
His remarks, at the end of a two-day conference on Asian security,
followed a top Chinese general's criticism of defences being developed by
the United States and Japan to protect against North Korean missiles.
"I'm not sure why they are so worried," Gates said. "Just as with the
Russians, we would be pleased to sit down with them and talk about the
capabilities and technical characteristics of this system and its
limitation.
"There may just not be a clear understanding on the part of the Chinese
about what we have in mind can and cannot do," he said.
Lieutenant General Zhang Qinsheng, the chief of military intelligence of
the People's Liberation Army, objected to the US-Japanese missile defence
project in a speech Saturday at the Shangri-La Dialogue on regional
security issues.
Zhang's concerns echo those of Russia, which fiercely opposes US plans to
deploy interceptor missiles in Poland and radar in the Czech Republic to
protect against missiles from Iran.
To overcome Moscow's opposition, Gates in April offered the Russians what
he said was an unprecedented partnership in missile defence and
inspections sites in Alaska and California.
Asked whether the United States would offer the same to China, Gates told
reporters, "I think if the Chinese were to express an interest in it we
would certainly take it seriously."
He said the US system was designed to thwart limited attacks by rogue
states or terrorists, not to defeat a large-scale threat of the kind
posed by the long-range missile arsenals of Russia and China.
"So anything we can do to provide transparency on that point and help
people understand the capabilities and characteristics of these systems,
we're prepared to do it," he said.
Gates is trying to encourage greater interaction with the Chinese
military, in part to avoid miscalculations as it undertakes a major
build-up of its forces.
Zhang said China was prepared to establish a "hotline" between the US and
Chinese defence ministries, meeting a long-standing US objective, and
that China was making gradual progress on US demands for greater
transparence.
But mistrust between the two countries is high.
A Pentagon report last week detailed China's push to acquire advanced
warships, submarines, aircraft and missiles, saying it would allow China
to project power far beyond its shores and alter regional military
balances.
Zhang, who called the Pentagon report "unreliable," raised it on the
sidelines of the conference with General Peter Pace, the chairman of the
Joint Chiefs of Staff.
"The Chinese are not happy with our depiction of their armed forces,"
Pace said.
"I recommended that they invite the authors of the report to China to sit
down and have discussion about what it is they think we see about them
that they don't see about themselves. And just get it on the table, in a
very open way, for discussion," he said.
"The way ahead from my standpoint is more discussion, more transparency,
if they want to have an impact on reports in the future," he said.
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