Covid jab team creates vaccine to tackle the toughest cancers

Pfizer scientists use same technology to develop therapy for hard-to-treat pancreatic tumours

SCIENTISTS have made a cancer vaccine breakthrough after manufacturers behind the Pfizer Covid jab used the same technology to stop the disease returning.

The vaccine, custom-made to each patient, can trigger the immune system to attack tumour cells and successfully keep the disease at bay.

Experts behind the Pfizer-biontech Covid-19 jab teamed up with doctors in New York to develop the vaccine for pancreatic cancer patients.

The phase I results of its clinical trial, the first of its kind, were presented at the annual meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) in Chicago. It is hoped the findings could herald a new era of treatment for other hard-to-treat cancers, as pancreatic cancer is often known as the “poster child” for such deadly tumours.

Around 10,500 new cases of pancreatic cancer are diagnosed every year in the UK, but just a quarter of patients survive for a year or more.

Researchers said these latest findings could pave the way for the technology to be used on other cancers.

Announcing a “war on cancer” earlier this year, Sajid Javid, the Health Secretary, pledged to invest in innovative treatments, such as cancer vaccines.

This new research raises hopes such vaccines could become available on the NHS in the next decade, under the government’s 10-year cancer plan.

Dr Vinod Balachandran, of the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, New York, and principal investigator, said: “Unlike some of the other immunotherapies, these MRNA vaccines do appear [to] stimulate immune responses in pancreatic cancer patients.

“The early results suggest that if you have an immune response, you may have a better outcome.”

Some 20 per cent of pancreatic patients are eligible for surgery, but only a small subset survive long term. By analysing the tumours, the researchers found they had large numbers of immune cells, especially T cells, which combat infection and help fight cancer.

Twenty patients with pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) – which accounts for around 90 per cent of all pancreatic cancer cases – were recruited for the trial. They underwent surgery to remove the cancer, and 72 hours later their tumour samples were shipped to Biontech in Germany to formulate their individualised vaccine – which is delivered intravenously.

The patients also received immunotherapy to help boost their response.

The vaccines use a piece of MRNA, genetic code from the tumour, to teach the body’s cells to make a protein that will trigger an immune response – the same technology used in Pfizer-biontech’s Covid-19 jab. The body then learns the cancer cells are, in fact, foreign and sends T cells to seek out and kill them if they return.

Sixteen patients received the first of nine vaccine doses nine weeks after surgery, and half of these produced a significant immune response.

At 18 months, all eight patients remained cancer free, suggesting the T

‘These MRNA vaccines do appear to stimulate immune responses in pancreatic cancer patients’

cells activated by the vaccine were halting the cancer’s recurrence.

In the eight patients who did not respond to the vaccine, however, six saw their cancer return just over a year later. The researchers are still investigating why half of the group did not mount a response.

Prof Ozlem Tureci, co-founder and chief medical officer at Biontech, said just 5 per cent of patients with PDAC responded to treatment. “We are committed to take up this challenge by leveraging our long-standing research in cancer vaccinology and are trying to break new ground in the treatment of such hard-to-treat tumours,” she said.

Chris Macdonald, head of research at Pancreatic Cancer UK, said the vaccine could be a “vital new weapon against the deadliest common cancer”.

♦ Bowel cancer patients could achieve complete remission thanks to an immunotherapy drug already approved on the NHS, a trial suggests.

Researchers from the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center tested Dostarlimab on 12 patients with bowel cancer. In all patients the cancer disappeared and they have remained cancerfree up to two years later.