Fifty years of BCG: remembering Professor Andrew Bruce

Most people treated for non-muscle-invasive bladder cancer (NMIBC) in the past fifty years owe something to a short research paper published in August 1976. One of its three authors, Professor Andrew Watt Bruce, died on June 18, 2026, in Kingston, Canada. He was 101 years old. WBCPC joins the urology and patient communities in remembering him.

Prof Bruce was born in Mintlaw, Scotland, in 1925 and studied medicine at the University of Aberdeen. He moved to Canada at the start of the 1960s to lead urology at Queen’s University in Kingston, and went on to lead the same departments at McGill University and the University of Toronto. He wrote more than 150 research papers.

One of them changed bladder cancer treatment around the world. BCG is a live vaccine, developed in France in the 1920s and given to children ever since to protect them against tuberculosis. Animal studies had hinted that it could also wake up the immune system against tumours. In Kingston, Alvaro Morales decided to try putting it straight into the bladder, working with the immunologist Donald Eidinger and with Prof Bruce, who was his head of department. The idea had already been turned down for national funding. Reviewers thought it was both unsafe and scientifically out of date.

The study, published in the Journal of Urology in August 1976, involved nine patients whose tumours kept coming back. Each had a small BCG injection in the skin first, then BCG into the bladder once a week for six weeks. Recurrences fell roughly twelvefold.

That six-week course was not the product of careful calculation. The BCG made in Canada at the time arrived in boxes of six vials, and the side effects tended to settle within a week, so Dr Morales gave one vial a week for six weeks. Fifty years later, that same six-week course is still how BCG treatment begins for patients everywhere. Very few decisions made in a hospital in 1972 are still being followed in clinics on every continent today.

Prof Bruce’s work as a teacher is part of this story too. Alvaro Morales was born in Bogotá, Colombia, and came to Kingston to train as a urologist. Prof Bruce taught him and backed his interest in how the immune system fights cancer, at a point when almost nobody else would. Dr Morales is now retired and still lives in Kingston.

What does this mean for patients today?

NMIBC accounts for 70 to 75% of all bladder cancer diagnoses, and BCG remains the standard treatment for people at high risk of the cancer coming back. It was the first immunotherapy, a treatment that works by using the body’s own immune system, proven to work against any cancer. For many people, it is the reason they still have their bladder.

Across our coalition, 17 member organisations in 14 countries support people going through this treatment. They answer the questions that come up between hospital appointments, run peer support groups, and provide information in the languages people speak at home.

If you or someone you care about is starting BCG treatment, our factsheet Understanding BCG treatment explains what to expect. Our member organisations also offer information and peer support in many different languages. Learn more about our member organisations.

References

1. Morales A, Eidinger D, Bruce AW. Intracavitary Bacillus Calmette-Guérin in the treatment of superficial bladder tumors. Journal of Urology, 1976;116(2):180 to 183. pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/820877
2. Lobo N, Brooks NA, Zlotta AR, et al. 100 years of Bacillus Calmette-Guérin immunotherapy: from cattle to COVID-19. Nature Reviews Urology, 2021;18(10):611 to 622. pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8204595
3. Obituary of Andrew Watt Bruce, Tribute Archive, 2026. tributearchive.com/obituaries/48777504/andrew-watt-bruce