A experimental cancer vaccine based on the mRNA developed by Moderna Inc and Merck & Co reduced the risk of death or recurrence of the deadliest skin cancer by 44%, compared with Keytruda, Merck’s immunotherapy alone, US researchers reported at a medical meeting on Sunday.
The findings suggest that adding a personalized cancer vaccine based on mRNA technology to Keytruda, which reactivates the immune response, could extend the time patients have without recurrence or death, said Dr. Jeffrey Weber, of the Perlmutter Langone Cancer Center. of NYU, who presented the findings.
From a cancer therapeutic standpoint in general, this is a potentially important advance,” Dr. Ryan Sullivan, a melanoma expert at Mass General Cancer who worked on the study, said in a statement.
The results, presented at the meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research held in Orlando (Florida), add data to the partial findings published by the companies in December. Additional data will be presented at an upcoming medical meeting and published in a peer-reviewed journal.
The combination treatment has earned breakthrough therapy designation in the United States and a PRIME plan designation from the European Medicines Agency, regulatory programs that aim to accelerate the development of breakthrough treatments.
The colaboration Merck/Moderna is one of several that combine powerful drugs that activate the immune system against cancer with mRNA vaccine technology. BioNTech SE and Gritstone Bio Inc are working on competing cancer vaccines based on mRNA technology.
The vaccine is custom-made from analysis of the patient’s tumors after surgical removal. Vaccines are designed to train the immune system to recognize and attack specific mutations in cancer cells.
keytrudafrom Merck, approved to treat melanoma and many other types of cancer, belongs to a class of widely used immunotherapies known as checkpoint inhibitors, designed to turn off the protein PD-1, or programmed death 1, which helps the cancer to evade the immune system.
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