Scientists behind game-changing cancer immunotherapies win Nobel medicine prize

A combination photo shows Ph.D. James P. Allison of MD Anderson Cancer Center at The University of Texas in this picture obtained from MD Anderson Cancer Center at The University of Texas on October 1, 2018 (R) and Kyoto University Professor Tasuku Honjo in Kyoto, Japan in this photo taken by Kyodo September 17, 2018. Picture taken September 17, 2018. Mandatory credit Kyodo/MD Anderson Cancer Center at The University of Texas/Handouts via REUTERS

STOCKHOLM/LONDON (Reuters) - American James Allison and Japanese Tasuku Honjo won the 2018 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine on Monday for game-changing discoveries about how to harness and manipulate the immune system to fight cancer.

The scientists' work in the 1990s has since swiftly led to new and dramatically improved therapies for cancers such as melanoma and lung cancer, which had previously been extremely difficult to treat.