Chief Scientific Officer and President of Research & Development, Pfizer
Search every verified Chris Fmedsci interview, podcast appearance, and on-the-record quote — each transcript cross-checked by AI and human review to confirm speaker identity. In a 2018 interview, Chris Boshoff, then Chief Scientific Officer and President of Research & Development at Pfizer, discussed his role as co-organizer of the upcoming Keystone Symposia meeting "Cancer Immunotherapy Combinations." He stated that the meeting would cover basic cancer research, translational immunology, and the latest insights into cancer therapy, and would be of interest to researchers and clinicians in oncology. Boshoff described checkpoint inhibitors as an established standard of care for certain cancers but noted that most patients do not respond to them or develop resistant disease. He expressed the belief that by 2025, most cancer patients would be treated with some form of immunotherapy. He highlighted the need to determine how to rationally combine immunotherapies with other treatments such as radiotherapy, chemotherapy, and targeted therapies, and emphasized the importance of preclinical data to inform correct scheduling and sequencing. He also identified molecules such as VISTA, LAG‑3, TIM‑3, ICOS, and TIGIT as potential next-generation targets for cancer immunotherapy.
“It's particularly interesting to learn about the molecules that we all believe will be the next generation of potential targets for cancer immunotherapy — for example VISTA, LAG‑3, TIM‑3, ICOS, TIGIT — and learning more about the molecular regulation of PD‑L1, PD‑1 as well as CTLA‑4.”
“We now know that checkpoint inhibitors have been established as a class, as a standard of care as single agents or in combination for certain cancers, but most patients with cancers do not respond to checkpoint inhibitors and those that do respond will develop resistant disease.”
“I believe we're the dawn of a new era; by 2025 most patients — not all patients but most patients with cancer — will be treated with an immunotherapy.”
“How are we going to integrate immunotherapy into standard of care cancer medicine — how are we going to integrate immunotherapy with radiotherapy, with cytotoxic therapies, chemotherapy, antibody‑drug conjugates and tyrosine kinase inhibitors — and which models should we use to predict rational combinations?”
“What will be the correct scheduling and sequencing, and what preclinical data can help us to inform how to combine these molecules — that is not all random, that is actually rational combination.”
“I'm co‑organizing the next immunotherapy meeting with colleagues from Yale and Oregon University; the program is designed to cover basic cancer research and cancer immunology as well as translational cancer immunology and the latest insights into cancer therapy.”
Dr. Chris Boshoff of Pfizer shares his reactions to the 2017 Keystone Symposia “Cancer Immunology and Immunotherapy” ...
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