Vax Before Cancer

→ August 15th, 2020

Eliminating fake vaccine news with pharmacist, nurse, and physician review.

Cancer Vaccine Breaking News

Study: Helping Produce Personalized Cancer Vaccines

Accurate prediction of binding between a major histocompatibility complex (MHC) allele and a peptide plays a major role in the synthesis of potential personalized cancer vaccines, reported a study published on July 13, 2020. The immune system struggles to distinguish between a cancerous and a healthy cell. In a patient suffering from cancer who has a particular MHC allele, only those peptides that bind with the MHC allele with high affinity, help the immune system recognize the cancerous cells.

These researchers used innovative modeling of 9251 possible MHC allele trigrams to identify about 258. These results significantly reduces the number of amino acid subsequences that need to be clinically tested when producing cancer vaccine candidates.

HPV Prevalence Highest After 5 Lifetime Sexual Partners

According to a study published on July 25, 2020, conducted among 5,093 human papillomavirus-unvaccinated, sexually experienced adults, aged 18-59 years of age, found genital HPV prevalence was the highest among persons with 5+ lifetime sexual partners.

HPV vaccine information, and related discount coupons, are found on this webpage.

'Charlie's Best Angel' Would Have Been 73 Years Old

Had she lived, the actress Farrah Fawcett would be 73 years old now. Best known for her breakout role in “Charlie’s Angels,” Fawcett died in 2009 at the age of 62 of human papillomavirus (HPV) related anal cancer, a disease that 'could be wiped out if parents follow the recommended guidelines and vaccinate their children against HPV', according to the American Cancer Society.

She was nominated for four Emmys and five Golden Globes and launched the Farrah Fawcett Foundation in 2007 with the goal of furthering prevention and research on the disease — a goal that could be realized for the coming generation stated SurvivorNet.

HPV vaccines are available today in most countries around the world. These cancer prevention vaccines include 9vHPV, 4vHPV, and, 2vHPV, says the U.S. CDC.

The American Cancer Society updated its guideline for HPV vaccinations on July 8, 2020, suggesting healthcare providers should routinely offer the HPV vaccine series to boys and girls between ages 9 and 12.

Cancer Vaccine Candidate Aspires to Offer Specific Anti-Tumor Immunity

Vaccibody AS and Nektar Therapeutics announced on August 12, 2020, that the first patient has been dosed in the combination therapy of the Phase 1/2a study evaluating bempegaldesleukin (bempeg), Nektar's CD122-preferential IL-2 pathway agonist, with VB10.NEO, Vaccibody's personalized neoantigen cancer vaccine, in patients with advanced squamous cell carcinoma of the head and neck.

Jonathan Zalevsky, Ph.D., Chief Research & Development Officer at Nektar commented: "... preclinical data demonstrated how a personalized cancer vaccine and a T cell proliferator can work synergistically to induce maximal expansion of vaccine-induced T cell clones, provide deep and durable responses, and at the same time, offer specific anti-tumor immunity."

Lung Cancer Fatalities Decreasing Faster Than Before

A new study published by the NEJM on August 13, 2020, found fatalities from the most common type of lung cancer in the USA, non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) was decreasing faster than new cases being identified. Population-level mortality from NSCLC in the USA fell sharply from 2013 to 2016, and survival after diagnosis improved substantially.

Furthermore, this improvement was consistent among all races and ethnic groups studied: non-Hispanic Asian or Pacific Islander, non-Hispanic white, Hispanic, and non-Hispanic Black.

This study's analysis suggests that a reduction in incidence along with treatment advances, particularly approvals for and use of targeted therapies, such as those tailored to attack mutations of the EGFR and ALK genes, is likely to explain the reduction in mortality observed during this period.