People with obesity are at a greater risk of developing cancer, in part due to their anticancer immune cells—better known as the 'Natural Killer (NK)' cell—being rendered useless due to their disease.
New research carried out by Dr. Andrew Hogan and team in the Londsdale Health Institute at Maynooth University, has found that the popular, and gold-standard pharmacological treatment for obesity, Glucagon-like peptide (GLP-1) analogues, can actually restore the NK cell function in the body including its ability to kill cancerous cells.
The research, published in the journal Obesity, also shows that the restored cancer-killing effect of NK cells is independent of the GLP-1’s main weight loss function so it appears the treatment is directly kick-starting the NK cells’ engine.
These findings will be presented at the 30th European Congress on Obesity in Dublin on 20th of May.
https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/988528#