Source : INDIA TODAY NEWS
Moderna, the US biotechnology company best known for its Covid-19 vaccine, saw its shares soar 177% in a single day after a personalised cancer vaccine it is developing with Merck succeeded in a large late-stage trial.
The experimental treatment helped prevent melanoma, a serious form of skin cancer, from returning or spreading in patients whose tumours had been removed through surgery, the companies said on Wednesday.
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The result is a potentially important breakthrough for Moderna’s mRNA technology, which shot to global prominence during the Covid pandemic. Scientists have long hoped the technology could be used beyond infectious diseases, including to create treatments tailored to an individual patient’s cancer.
Moderna shares closed at $174.38, up 176.97%, marking the company’s biggest-ever one-day gain.
The vaccine, known as intismeran autogene, is personalised for each patient. Scientists analyse mutations found in a person’s tumour and create an mRNA vaccine designed to train the immune system to recognise and attack cancer cells carrying those specific mutations.
The treatment was tested alongside Merck’s immunotherapy drug Keytruda in a Phase 3 trial involving more than 1,000 melanoma patients at high risk of recurrence.
Unlike chemotherapy, which can also damage healthy cells, personalised cancer vaccines aim to direct the immune system towards mutations found specifically in a patient’s tumour.
“It is a big deal for the field in general,” Dr Ryan Sullivan, director of the Center for Melanoma at Mass General Brigham Cancer Institute, told news agency Reuters, adding that the result could spur further investment in similar approaches for other cancers.
The companies have not yet released the full results of the trial and will continue following patients to determine whether the treatment improves overall survival.
Earlier five-year data from a smaller study had shown that the combination reduced the risk of melanoma returning by about half and cut the risk of the disease spreading to distant parts of the body by 59% compared with Keytruda alone.
Moderna and Merck are already testing personalised cancer vaccines in other cancers, including lung, bladder and kidney cancer, while earlier-stage studies are under way in pancreatic and stomach cancers.
The treatment still requires regulatory approval before it can reach patients. But the successful late-stage trial has raised hopes that the mRNA technology that powered Covid vaccines could eventually open a new avenue for treating cancer.
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SOURCE :- TIMES OF INDIA
