Major breakthrough in anti-cancer! Chinese experts have developed a cancer vaccine, which can eliminate tumors in the whole body.
Smallpox took away the lives of 300 million people in the 20th century, and it took nearly 200 years to completely end it. In 1980, the World Health Organization officially announced the eradication of smallpox, and the biggest contributor was the smallpox vaccine.
Now, the biggest threat to health is cancer. According to the statistics of the National Cancer Center, a total of 4.06 million people were diagnosed with cancer in 2016, and the death toll reached 2.41 million, which is even more terrible than COVID-19. Is there such a vaccine that can end cancer? A study from China this year may give you hope.
Chinese experts successfully developed tumor vaccine after a single injection of the drug
Ms. M (pseudonym), 66, was unfortunate. She was diagnosed with advanced gastric cancer in 2017, and subsequently underwent surgery and chemotherapy to remove cancer cells from her body. Eight months after the treatment, the cancer cells in her body recurred and had already metastasized to the peritoneum and lymph nodes. When he received chemotherapy again, his body had serious side effects, so he had to stop the treatment.
But at the same time, she was also lucky to participate in the clinical trial of Neo MoDC, a new antigen vaccine, under the advice of her doctor. Then she received a series of tests and a separate subcutaneous injection of Neo MoDC vaccine for 2 months to activate the anti-tumor immune response of T cells. On the 65th day of the experiment, the doctor began to treat her with Navuxumab (PD-1, drug O) every 14 days.
After 5 days of treatment, the “miracle” appeared! The malignant ascites in Ms. M disappeared, and the imaging results showed that the volume of supraclavicular lymph node metastasis decreased by about 30%. Two months later, all metastatic lymph nodes were reduced to less than 1 cm, and complete remission was achieved in the lymph nodes. The metastatic lesions of the ovary were also reduced by 20%. On the 231st day after vaccination, the imaging results showed that all the lesions in Ms M’s body had completely disappeared. At 389 days, the CT results showed that the metastatic lesions of her ovary had completely disappeared.
The follow-up CT reexamination results showed that by October 2021, the focus in Ms. M’s body had subsided for more than 25 months.
The research was conducted by a research team from Fujian Cancer Hospital, China, and the School of Life Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, and published in the journal ”Nature” in June this year. The emergence of new antigen vaccines undoubtedly brings new hope to countless cancer patients. But many people have never heard of it. What kind of vaccine is it?
What is a cancer vaccine? How does it kill cancer cells?
Cancer vaccines mainly use tumor cell related antigens to awaken the body’s immune system against cancer. At present, they can be divided into preventive and therapeutic vaccines. Preventive vaccines prevent cancer by preventing and killing viruses. Our common HPV vaccine belongs to this type of vaccine, while therapeutic vaccines control and kill cancer cells by activating the body’s immune function.
The principle of therapeutic vaccine is to stimulate dendritic cells in the immune system through the vaccine. When these cells present tumor antigens, they will induce cytotoxic T lymphocytes, which can be targeted at specific cancer cells. At the same time, it can also stimulate and assist T cells to secrete cells rapidly, indirectly increasing the attack of toxic T cells on cancer cells.
What are the advantages of cancer vaccines？
1. Small side effects
Compared with traditional radiotherapy, chemotherapy and targeted therapy, the side effects of cancer vaccine are less, and it has the characteristics of high safety and individualization.
2. Low recurrence rate
”Greenwich Life Science” published a clinical trial involving 168 breast cancer patients who were treated with GP2 vaccine. Within 5 years after treatment, the recurrence rate was 0.
Don’t be afraid of cancer after you have cancer vaccine?
Although the effect of cancer vaccine is very good, it also has some limitations.
1. Small indication
At present, most cancer vaccines are in experimental or early clinical trials, and very few vaccines can be marketed. At present, there are only two types of cancer vaccines on the market, namely Provenge vaccine for prostate cancer and Cuba Cimavax vaccine for non-small cell lung cancer.
2. Difficult in R&D
Vaccine research and development needs to face the problems of immune escape and endogenous/exogenous drug resistance in the treatment process, and the basis of vaccine research and development is antigen. Nowadays, the number of antigens in the antigen library is limited, and research cannot be carried out smoothly in many cases.
3. The price can be very expensive
Insiders predict that the average price of a single course of cancer vaccine will be 150000 US dollars, which is a huge burden for most ordinary people.
Although the cancer vaccine has a good effect, everything is still in the research and development stage and has not really entered our life. For ordinary people, it is the most critical to do a good job in daily cancer prevention measures.
For cancer, ordinary people should still do a good job of prevention in life
In fact, it is not difficult to prevent cancer. The cancer research institute under the World Health Organization has issued 12 suggestions on cancer prevention, including no smoking/no use of tobacco products in any form, keeping away from second-hand smoke and second-hand smoke environment, keeping weight in a healthy range, exercising properly, and not drinking alcohol. The best amount of alcohol consumption should be 0. The skin should be protected from direct ultraviolet radiation in daily life If conditions permit, cancer prevention vaccine can be inoculated and infection should be prevented in daily life, non-toxic products should be selected for indoor decoration, breast feeding should be insisted on, long-term exposure to polluted environment should not be allowed, and cancer screening should be carried out as soon as possible.
These are simple and easy actions in life. The key is whether you are willing to implement them and stick to them.