Skin cancer vaccine trial targets high-risk melanomas

Vaccines that train the body to kill cancer cells are being given to British patients in a revolutionary treatment.

Dozens of people with melanoma skin cancer are taking part in a global introduction of the world's first personalised vaccine for the disease, led by University College London Hospitals (UCLH) NHS Foundation Trust.

The vaccine is custom-made for each patient and trains their immune system to recognise and hunt down the unique mutations on the surface of their tumours.

It is injected into melanoma patients after surgery, aiming to cure them of cancer by getting the immune system to destroy any “rogue cells” that remain so the disease cannot recur elsewhere in the body.

Melanoma is a type of skin cancer that can spread around the body. It affects about 16,700 people each year in the United Kingdom, killing 2300. The main symptom is a new or changing mole.

The vaccine, called mRNA-4157 (V940), is the world's first personalised mRNA cancer jab for melanoma.

Personalised cancer vaccines are a new field of medicine based on the same mRNA technology that was used in Covid jabs. They have shown promise in trials for other cancers.

The new trial, involving the pharmaceutical companies Moderna and MSD, is testing the first personalised mRNA jab for melanoma. The same therapy is also used in trials for the treatment of lung, bladder and kidney cancer.

Dr Heather Shaw, the trial’s national co-ordinating investigator, said: “There is a real hope these will be the gamechangers in immunotherapy.” – The Times