Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia (ALL) & B-cell Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia (B-ALL)
Acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) is a cancer of the lymphoid line of blood cells characterized by the development of large numbers of immature lymphocytes. Extramedullary involvement is frequent (central nervous system [CNS], lymph nodes, spleen, liver, and testis). Approximately 85% of ALLs are of precursor B-cells. ALL accounts for .3% of all new cancer cases, and .3% of all cancer deaths.It is estimated that 6,660 new cases of ALL and 1,560 deaths related to the disease occurred in the US in 2022. ALL represents 12% of all leukemia cases progresses rapidly and is typically fatal within weeks or months if left untreated.
The majority of newly diagnosed ALL patients are pediatric, however there are still a significant number of adults ALL patients. The goal of therapy is to lead patients into a long-enough remission so that an allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT, the only curative approach) could be performed, leading to leukemia-free survival rates of 14% to 43%. There is an urgent need to develop new therapies for ALL for patients who are not candidates for HSCT or relapse after.
Cellectis’UCART22 is an allogeneic CAR T product that is being evaluated in the BALLI-01 study in adult patients with relapsed or refractory Acute lymphoblastic leukemia (r/r ALL). This product candidate has the potential to become an off-the-shelf available therapy for adult patients with r/r ALL that uniquely targets CD22.