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Target for medication, Her2 is more pronounced at cancer site. The toxin is active during time that cell replicates, with cancer cells that’s normally much more frequent than with normal, healthy cells.
If cancer consists of numerous pathways used to supply nutrition and discard wastes, I visualize it somewhat like lair of prairie dogs with multitude of access-egress tunnels.
Trastuzumab locates the her2 target and enters the cancer, where the linker (MCC) breaks down and releases a very potent DM1 toxin that explodes like an earthquake trying to cave in as many tunnels as possible. Depending on strength of burrow, destruction of nest could be total, significant, or minimal. Overall damage to domain factors in how long it will be out-of-service, i.e. it's the measurement of drug's effectiveness.
Hope that this analogy is helpful.
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