One day in the not - too - distant - future , doctors could be cure Cancer the Crab with a $ 5 shot . It might sound far - get now but investigator at Duke University have successfully cover oral cancer in mice usingethanol shot . Within eight daytime , the mice were tumour - barren .

Using alcohol to treat genus Cancer is n’t new .   Ethanol cutting out ( a therapy where pure ethanol is directly shoot into a tumor outgrowth ) is used to cure specific types ofliver cancer . It has alike success rate as operating theater but it comes at a much cheaper Leontyne Price tag –   it costsjust $ 5 .

But it also come with limitations . One trouble is that it involves a large intensity of ethanol . This means there ’s a high risk the ethanol will leak out into and damage the surrounding tissue paper , so it can only be used to cover certain type of tumour   ( say , liver cancer ) .

To get around this job , the researcher mixed the ethanol solution with a chemical called ethyl cellulose . This turns the solution into a colloidal gel as soon as it is shoot into the tumor , preventing leakages and making indisputable it remains concentrated in the cancerous area .

The injection was then commit to hamsters with cheek Crab . Within seven Clarence Day , all but one neoplasm had disappeared . By the eighth sidereal day , all seven tumors were gone . This break the experimentation , release in the journalScientific Reports , an incredibly telling 100 pct success rate .

Compare this to the control grouping , where the hamsters were injected with virginal ethanol . The researchers only notice positive results after come in large volumes of ethanol . Even then , only a thirdof tumors had disappeared by mean solar day eight .

While the results are extremely encouraging , it is still only an former substantiation - of - construct trial and further trials with large sample sizes –   not to mention humans –   will be needed before it depart on to have a   real - existence use .

Even then , it is likely surgical operation will remain the first course of action in places like the US and UK . The real benefit of ethanol ablation will be seen in developing countries , where aesculapian supplies and personnel are in short supply . Nine out of 10people in the developing universe do n’t have admission to surgery so a safe , portable , and tawdry noninvasive alternative   would have huge   life - saving   consequences .