Cancer vaccine by 2030? (News article)

Article posted yesterday on some news/medical sites.

Highlights:

"Vaccines that target cancer could be available before the end of the decade, according to the husband and wife team behind one of the most successful Covid vaccines of the pandemic."

" ... the mRNA technology at the heart of BioNTech’s Covid vaccine could be repurposed so that it primes the immune system to attack cancer cells instead of invading coronaviruses."

" ... could be available before 2030."

"Rather than carrying code that identifies viruses, the vaccine contains genetic instructions for cancer antigens – proteins that stud the surfaces of tumour cells."

"The firm (BioNTech) now has several cancer vaccines in clinical trials."

But then of course the other shoe drops:

"The German firm hopes to develop treatments for bowel cancer, melanoma and other cancer types, but substantial hurdles lie ahead. The cancer cells that make up tumours can be studded with a wide variety of different proteins, making it extremely difficult to make a vaccine that targets all of the cancer cells and no healthy tissues."

A pattern we've seen before: a new technique, approach, etc., looks promising, offers hope for a breakthrough treatment, maybe even cure, but the jury is still out on whether it will pan out or not.

But it's one more thing to keep an eye on, and look for future progress reports on it, just in case this time it really is a silver bullet.

Perhaps one reason for optimism in this case: according to the article these researchers did some pretty good work on COVID vaccines, so maybe some of that success can be transferable to searching for a cancer vaccine.

We'll see.

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2022/oct/16/vaccines-to-treat-cancer-possible-by-2030-say-biontech-founders

Cancer cells will always be trickier, because while a virus is always an outsider, the cancer cells are actually your cells, just gone awry. Like the drunk uncle at a party.

In the same way they created the Covid vaccine in one day (but took many months to approve) they could come up with a technique for sampling your individual cancer and targeting it. The approval process would be the big hurdle.

i can see it now: the anti-science gang will claim that elon musk is chipping slaves for mars

It’s always going to be an uphill battle. Considering that our purpose here is to pass on our genetic material and then ensure the survival of our offspring until they can pass on theirs, the system wants us removed after that. It has many ways to see that happens.

Stephen S said...
My son was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes about 10 years ago. I quickly learned that the primary purpose of articles that discussed some new breakthrough mostly boiled down to some PR they were trying to gin up, likely to just get funding.

So I am skeptical.

Anything pushed out to 2030 means whoever is saying this doesn't have a clue when, or if, it has a chance. Remember Interferon from way back in the day?

Wouldn't hurt to try, though.

I’m with Wings. Anything is worth exploring, and the two scientists involved in this already created one breakthrough with the Mrna vaccine. Yup, cancer may be more complicated (although COVID is proving itself to be pretty complicated). But technology has done some amazing things in the last decade and continues to evolve

Pretty much on the same subject. Moderna’s CEO today talked about merging with Merck. He said it should speed up the ongoing phase 2 trial for individual treatment of cancer. It would seem that a competitive environment could only help speed up outcomes using mRNA as a cure for cancer.
Jack

I'm going to "fly high" with the thoughts shared by Wings of Eagles ...

My thoughts are formed from this experience ...

My great-grandpa lived to be almost 100 & was born in a log house when Teddy Roosevelt lived in the White House.

The stories he shared still resonate with me ...

He spoke of his young cousin ~ joining their family in the "log house" when my grandfather helped his father farm with horses & chopped firewood every Saturday morning.

His young cousin joined their family after losing his mother ~ who "coughed herself to death" ~ after contracting tuberculosis, which was still rampant in that era.

Years later, Dr. Jonas Salk came forward with the miraculous vaccine.

Great-Grandpa witnessed the evolution of life-saving antibiotics, blood transfusions that saved lived on battlefields, and the eradication of diseases in America ~ such as typhoid fever.

To listen to his stories gave me such a profound sense of how medicine ADVANCED ~ in just his lifetime.

Here, in the past 20 years, we have seen our battle brothers embark on new treatments with XTANDI, XOFIGO, ZYTIGA, and now PLUVICTO.

Even TAXOTERE chemotherapy infusions for prostate cancer patients are relatively new ~ being first approved in 2004.

I think ZYTIGA was the breakthrough medication that carried me this far.

I was my doctor's first patient to try it, and even my oncologist had no idea what to expect. That was over 9 years ago, and it's still helping me.

I remember when I had 9 empty bottles, and was elated, because those first 9 bottles had carried me through an entire school year.

There's over 85 bottles lined up on my shelf, nowadays. I just picked up another bottle from the pharmacy yesterday.

Cancer research is moving FORWARD, and it IS advancing.

When my dad had leukemia some years ago, he was saved by experimental blends of chemotherapy, in the nick of time.

We are not going backwards.

There are scientists working on cancer research in laboratories ~ every single day. The research is relentless ... it will not stop.

I will celebrate EVERY time the treatment landscape expands ...

Can't wait to see what "tomorrow" will bring!

Here's to new vistas, and treatment horizons ~

CYCLONE ~ Iowa State University