[d--b]

If it is the case that there are such treatments (easy to produce, 100% efficacy, no side effect) that cure fairly common deadly disease such as colorectal cancer in mice, and that never make it to human trial, there is something seriously broken about medical research...

[estearum]

No, the issue is that mice are very different from humans.

The only thing such a state of affairs clearly indicates is broken is using mice as proto-human test subjects.

Which of course, when you state it like that, is obviously suboptimal. But no one knows what to do about it.

[gus_massa]

Mice are good because they are super cheap.

It's useful as a very early test. They used a shotgun approach, they tested 9 bacterias and 1 of them was suspenseful. At least it was suspenseful for 2 weeks, until the study ended. It's very difficult to extrapolate that to the 5 year survival rate in humans.

[estearum]

Correct, this is how drug development works.

[d--b]

Right, yes, at least that study proved that some bacteria eat cancerous cells in at least one mammal.

If that particular bacteria doesn't work in humans it may still trigger a search for a bacteria that does.

Still being optimistic about this :)

[estearum]

Yep, it's not wasted effort. This is how science works! Lots of dead ends and then suddenly a breakthrough.