A personalized mRNA vaccine reduced the risk of skin cancer returning or the recipient dying by 42% when used alongside an immunotherapy drug, according to long-awaited results for what could become the first approved mRNA vaccine for cancer. Oncologists regard a risk reduction of 10% as substantial, says Kristen Radford, an immunotherapist at Mater Research in Brisbane. A risk reduction of more than 40% 'would send many researchers over the Moon', adds Seth Cheetham, a geneticist at the University of Queensland in Brisbane, Australia. The personalized vaccine, called intismeran, is not designed to prevent skin cancer, or melanoma, from developing in the first place, but to stop it returning in people who have already undergone surgery to remove tumours. Anticipation for the trial results has been building since August, when the vaccine's developers ' Merck, based in Rahway, New Jersey, and Moderna, which is headquartered in Cambridge, Massachusetts ' announced early positive...
learn more
