THE first cancer treatments were brutal: in 3000 BC, Ancient Egyptians started removing breast tumours by burning them off with a tool they called a Even when chemotherapy arrived in the 1940s, it was essentially poison that attacked cancer cells and the body alike, resulting in terrible side effects.
Fortunately, we are now entering an era of 鈥減recision medicine鈥� in which cancer treatments can be tailor-made for individuals so they get the best responses with the fewest side effects.
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One approach being tested involves the use of 鈥減ersonalised vaccines鈥�. We tend to think of vaccines as a means to prevent disease, like covid-19, but they can also be used therapeutically. Personalised vaccines are made on a custom basis and train an individual鈥檚 immune system to recognise unique markers on their cancer, so that it can then launch a targeted attack.
These vaccines have only been tested in small clinical trials so far, but the results have been astonishing. One of the first people to try one described how his lung tumours 鈥� which had been so big they were protruding out of his back 鈥� began shrinking before his very eyes. He is now completely cancer-free.
Even some infamously hard-to-treat cancers, such as those of the brain and pancreas, have been eliminated in some cases using personalised vaccines. One of the main benefits is that this approach causes almost no side effects because of its precise targeting of tumours.
Of course, making a unique vaccine for each person is costly and time-consuming. But if this continues to have spectacular results, there will be a strong appetite to drive down cost and manufacturing time.
Before becoming household names in 2020 for developing covid-19 vaccines, BioNTech in Germany and Moderna in the US were two of the first companies to begin working on personalised cancer vaccines. They are now pumping the profits earned from their coronavirus jabs into larger clinical trials of cancer vaccines, so we can find out for sure if they work.
This suggests there could be a silver lining to the pandemic 鈥� it may have sped up a revolution in cancer care, with not an Ancient Egyptian fire drill in sight.
