According to media reports, the founder of German BioNTech recently said in an interview that using the new crown vaccine technology can develop cancer vaccines, and predicted that cancer vaccines may be released before 2030!
This topic quickly became a hot search as soon as it came out, causing heated discussions among netizens. Currently, cancer is one of the important diseases that threaten human health. The latest data from the National Cancer Center shows that in 2020, there were 19.29 million new cancer patients worldwide, of which 4.57 million were in China, accounting for 23.7% of the world's total. Since China ranks first in the world in terms of population, the number of new cancers is far higher than other countries. If a vaccine can eliminate cancer, it is undoubtedly a great discovery that benefits mankind and society. So, is this really the case? What exactly is the cancer vaccine
?
Relevant R&D personnel explained that the cancer vaccine mentioned here is different from other vaccines. The cancer vaccine has no preventive function and can only be used for treatment. The principle is that some cancer patients often have gene mutations. Vaccines can induce and activate immune responses, help the immune system in the body recognize gene mutations and kill cancer cells through immune responses. So can cancer vaccines truly treat cancer?
Cancer vaccine is a neogenic antigen vaccine that mainly relies on stimulating the body's active immunity. Based on gene sequencing, the vaccine develops an individualized "high-end customized" vaccine based on different mutation sites and numbers of each cancer patient. Its outstanding feature is that it can "tailor-made" the corresponding vaccine for each patient's tumor tissue mutation antigen, which can ensure that each patient has its own exclusive vaccine, and ultimately allow patients to benefit from individualized treatment methods in the long run.
Currently, multiple individualized neogenic antigen vaccine clinical trials have been carried out, including lung cancer, bladder cancer , pancreatic cancer , liver cancer , melanoma, brain glioma and more than 40 tumors. Cancer vaccines have been proven to be combined with other treatment methods such as chemotherapy/radiotherapy, targeted drugs, immune checkpoint inhibitors, cell stimulation factors, and have a more significant therapeutic effect.
Can the cancer vaccine really "clear cancer cells in one shot"?
In fact, after hearing this news, many people misunderstood cancer vaccine . The cancer vaccine mentioned in this news is "therapeutic vaccine" , rather than "preventive vaccines" such as hepatitis B, polio, and new coronavirus vaccine .
Although the current research on cancer vaccines has made great breakthroughs, there are still many challenges in widespread application in oncology clinical treatment. Cancer vaccines are not "magic drugs", and the wish of netizens to "clear cancer cells with one shot" is still difficult to realize. Cancer vaccines are biological products and need to be used in combination with other anti-tumor drugs such as chemotherapy/radiotherapy, targeted drugs, etc. to improve the effectiveness of the vaccine. A shot of curing cancer is still just an ideal at present. The real obstacles are long and long. Let us look forward to it together!
References:
[1] This magazine reported. The National Cancer Center released the latest issue of national cancer statistics [J]. Shanghai Nursing, 2022, 22(04): 72.
[2] Hu Tiantian, Qiu Xudan, Zhang Yan, Li Kaigang, Du Juan. Research progress of individualized cancer vaccine treatment based on tumor neogenic antigens [J]. Modern Oncology Medicine, 2021, 29(19): 3495-3499.
Author profile: Master of Pharmacology, Sun Yat-sen University, currently a deputy chief pharmacist at Grade A hospital, clinical pharmacist in the Department of Neurology, and a member of the Science Popularization Committee of the Guangdong Pharmacy Society. He has been awarded the "Mysfunction Popularization Ambassador" certificate from the China Cardiovascular Health Alliance and Toutiao Health.
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