Filenews 13 September 2024
The revolutionary change in cancer therapeutics began in 2010 with the application of immunotherapy in the treatment of solid tumours, with excellent results to date, increasing the percentage of patients who are free to relapse and/or cure.
The m-RNA platform
Taking advantage of the m-RNA platform used in the COVID-19 vaccine during the pandemic, the m-RNA cancer vaccine for skin melanoma was developed and created for the first time.
The first vaccine in Greece in a patient with melanoma was given on 17/1/2024 at the First Oncology Clinic of the Metropolitan Hospital, in Neo Faliro, with Mr. Bafaloukos as the main researcher. Since then, it has been administered to many patients around the world, but also in Greece at four centers as part of a phase III clinical trial.
Lung cancer
The m-RNA vaccine is now being tested in non-small cell lung cancer. Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer death. In 2020 there were 1.8 million deaths worldwide, accounting for 18% of all cancer deaths. In Europe, lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer death, with 384,000 deaths per year.
The phase I clinical trial, the first study developed by Biontech called BNT 116, started in England and is being conducted at 34 research centers in seven countries: the US, England, Germany, Hungary, Poland, Spain and Turkey. A total of 130 patients will receive the vaccine: either in the early stage of the disease or before surgery or radiotherapy, or in an advanced stage of the disease or in recurrent lung cancer.
A phase III study is currently being conducted in our country in stage II-IIIB non-small cell lung cancer (N2) with the m-RNA vaccine developed by Merck (MSD) and MODERNA called V940 (m-RNA-4157). Patients after surgery and adjunctive therapy will be randomized to receive V940 vaccine with or without immunotherapy. Approximately 900 patients worldwide will be involved (Interpath-002 study).
The vaccine uses messenger RNA (m-RNA) similar to COVID-19 vaccines that gives instructions for the production and synthesis of specific proteins that are necessary and essentially trains the immune system to fight cancer cells that express specific tumour antigens. It is noted that it leaves healthy cells intact and thus does not have the side effects of chemotherapy.
The new era
We are therefore entering a very exciting new era of immunotherapy clinical trials with the enhancement of m-RNA vaccines, which will be applied to other solid tumours, such as pancreatic, urothelial, prostate and other cancers.
It seems that soon the medical community will move on to lung cancer in phase II and III studies and finalize the positive results with or without the combination with the immunotherapy currently used, as is already done in cutaneous melanoma, where there are published very encouraging results of the phase IIB study, where the probability of death was reduced by 62%. In hundreds of volunteer patients with operated melanoma completing the phase III study (1200 patients), final results are awaited.
The new era for cancer treatment has already begun excitingly and gives rise to well-founded hopes for millions of people.
