Early human trials of a novel cancer therapy that employs a typical virus to infect and eradicate cancerous cells have shown great promise, according to UK researchers.

While other patients' tumours shrank, one patient's malignancy completely disappeared.

The medication is a herpes simplex virus that has been altered to kill tumours in a weaker, less potent form.

The injection may ultimately provide a lifeline to more people with advanced malignancies, according to specialists, but larger and longer research will be required.

A participant in the continuing phase one safety trial being conducted by the Institute of Cancer Research and the Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust is 39-year-old builder Krzysztof Wojkowski of west London.

His salivary gland carcinoma, which is located close to the mouth, was discovered in 2017. At the time, his cancer spread despite surgery and various therapies.

I was informed that I had run out of options and was getting end-of-life care. Being given the chance to participate in the trial was fantastic because it was sad.

His cancer seems to have been cured after a brief course of virus therapy, which uses a highly modified form of the herpes virus that often causes cold sores.

"My cancer was entirely cured with five weeks of injections every two weeks. It's been two years since I've had cancer.

By infiltrating the malignant cells and causing them to burst as well as by stimulating the immune system, the injections placed directly into the tumour target cancer in two different ways.

The trial's about 40 patients have tried the treatment.

The treatment responses observed were "really amazing," according to lead researcher Prof. Kevin Harrington, spanning a variety of advanced tumours, including cancer of the gullet (oesophagus) and a rare type of eye cancer.

"It is unusual to see such strong response rates in early stage clinical studies, as their main objective is to test the safety of the medication and they involve patients with very advanced cancers for whom current treatments have stopped functioning," he said.

"I am interested to see if we continue to show improvements when we treat more people," the author said.

The use of a virus to treat cancer is not new to science. A few years ago, the NHS approved T-Vec, a cold virus-based treatment, for advanced skin cancer.

Numerous treatments can be effectively combined, according to research, and virus therapies like this one may be added to our arsenal of cancer medicines.