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Deevilknievel t1_ivvy38a wrote

Vaccitech announced plans to advance the SNAPvax platform for use in treating human papilloma virus-associated cancer in 2023.

That’s like 50 days away!

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Acceptable_Lie_666 t1_ivx3lzu wrote

To be fair there are already vaccines for HPV

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Sentazar t1_ivx3r1o wrote

But....cancer caused by having not hpv

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Acceptable_Lie_666 t1_ivx47fk wrote

What I was saying is that it’s not a breakthrough. Still, the more the better in this case.

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Yes_hes_that_guy t1_ivx5mfh wrote

The HPV vaccine is intended to prevent you from getting HPV which increases the risk of getting some cancers. This vaccine is aimed at directly fights those cancers which is much more important for the large portion of the population that have already contracted HPV.

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nickram81 t1_ivxy6rs wrote

We know there is a vaccine for the virus. It’s cool that there is about to be a vaccine for the cancer caused by the virus.

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TheReigningSupreme t1_ivwrj0s wrote

(If someone can tell me how to host or post the article, I'll try!)

Taken from article:

Highlights

• Tumor-specific T cells are necessary but not sufficient for therapeutic efficacy

• IV vaccination promotes tumor regression by remodeling the TME

• Systemic IFN-I following IV vaccination alters intratumoral Chil3+ monocytes

• Enrichment of human homologs of Chil3+ monocytes is associated with worse outcomes

Limitations

There are several limitations to this study. First, the key observations were performed in murine tumor models that may not accurately reflect the tumor immune microenvironment in humans. Key features including tumor architecture, vascularization, growth rate, and immune infiltrate may differ in patients when compared to a transplanted tumor in mice. Second, we have used two murine tumor models (MC38 and TC-1) that are both immune-inflamed tumors. As such, the findings of this study may not model immune-excluded or immune-desert tumors. Third, although we have performed experiments using IFNAR1 blocking antibodies to show that vaccine-induced IFN-I can modulate the Chil3+ monocytes in the tumor, we did not provide direct evidence that Chil3+ monocytes are responsible for suppressing the antigen-specific CD8+ T cells. Finally, the human TCGA data included in this study highlight LGG and ccRCC, two cancer indications where the enrichment of HuChil3 monocyte genes is associated with worse survival compared to pan monocyte genes; this observation may not be generalizable to all tumors. Nevertheless, despite these limitations we believe these data provide a translatable approach for using innate stimulation by intravenous vaccination to potentially improve T cell function in tumors that express such inhibitory profiles.

Declaration of interests

A.S.I., G.M.L., and R.A.S. are listed as inventors on patents describing polymer-based vaccines. A.S.I. and G.M.L. are employees of Vaccitech North America, which is commercializing polymer-based drug delivery technologies for immunotherapeutic applications. F.B. and S.M. are employees of Genentech, a member of the Roche group, which develops and markets drugs for profit

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personAAA t1_ivx3dun wrote

To explain some of this to lay readers. Cancers are weird. Everything from the shape and structure of them to how they get and structure the blood supply system. This paper and its subfield focus on the local immune environment of cancers.

Cancers somehow avoid being killed off by the immune system. Why the immune is not working on the cancer is a big question.

One thing being tried with this vaccine approach is teaching the immune system hey this actually is cancer.

This paper has for IV given vaccines, the immune system is working two ways to fight cancer. The innate immune system is working in the local tumor environment. T cells are boosted and fight the cancer better.

This study was done in mice, so don't get hopes up too much. How much different between lab mice tumors and a particular human cancer is a big question.

Cancer is better understood as a collection of diseases. The genotype of the cancer, the location, and tissue of origin all matter. Not all cancers are as scary as others. Don't panic if you here the c word. Find out what it is more in depth before worrying too much. Stressing yourself out wouldn't help.

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zv88909 t1_iw0432l wrote

Mouse models are actually pretty good, and the transplantable tumor models like mc38 are more aggressive than essentially any human cancer. The huge issue with mouse models is people starting the study very early after establishing the tumor in mice, when the tumor is quite weak really.

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cinemachick t1_ivwqoq7 wrote

Do the animals already have cancer, or do they induce cancer in the animals for testing purposes? I hope they were given loving care after the study was over, cancer sucks

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ForeverStaloneKP t1_ivwykwb wrote

>I hope they were given loving care after the study was over,

They train and hire animal husbandry technicians to care for the animals daily before and during the studies, but post-study the animals are typically euthanized to prevent suffering. These people work hard and they have a tough job looking after animals they know won't be here soon, and of course people tend to blame/attack them for being involved in animal testing as they are low hanging fruit, an easy target on the front line, despite them working hard to ensure the animals are well cared for.

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[deleted] t1_ivx7oa3 wrote

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CultCrossPollination t1_ivxdtkf wrote

Human interaction causes stress to (non-pet) laboratory mice. Handling should be as fast as possible and as limited as possible, and cages should be enriched as much as possible. Source: I work with mice in tumor immunology. Rats, however, can really be very difficult to work with though. Because they clearly have a much higher social awareness and are much more intelligent then mice. You can kill a mouse next to his buddy, and he couldn't care less. You kill a rat across the room to a random rat, the guy/gall starts screaming the ears of your head. Source: I don't (want to) work with rats.

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Stummi t1_ivxhimh wrote

IMHO the really hypocritic part about this is that the suffering of animals for Scientific progress is a tiny fraction compared to those that suffer for Meat and Dairy production, and one could argue that the first brings humanity forward why the second doesn't. I say that as a non-vegetarian btw, but IMHO if you enjoy meat (as I do) you don't have much ground to be against animal testing

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OvoidPovoid t1_ivws4ez wrote

This was my question as well. Like can they initiate cancer at will, and if so, how?

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Imaginary_Cup_691 t1_ivxngcp wrote

They can. I forget what the substance its called but they know how to induce arthritis and whatever they want basically. The arthritis one is like harvested exterior yeast cell walls harvested to make a product that somehow induces arthritis. It all gets way more in depth than we think about, but they know how to coax cancer 100%. Probably know a lot of good ways to reverse it too but that’s not as fun or profitable

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Chris_2767 t1_ivx3ohi wrote

I am baffled by the idea that there can even be such a thing as a cancer vaccine

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Environmental_Cake97 t1_ivy03nb wrote

Well yeah. The problem with cancer is that it is immune privileged. It’s IS part of your body. Even when it was caused by a virus, the part that replicates like a bacterial colony is still you.

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Zozorrr t1_ivy6iho wrote

Just think of it in terms of getting your adaptive immune system to recognize cancer cells in your body as foreign (ie not “self”). If that helps.

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Chris_2767 t1_iw6qclf wrote

that's precisely what I find so baffling about it. It sounds like unreal scientific progress

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pittguy578 t1_ix6i1pf wrote

I think with increased computing power .. including quantum computing.. we may be on the verge of some real breakthroughs in medicine. Plus the fact just in general real time data can be shared between researchers is also increasing the pace of advancement

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unripenedboyparts t1_iw0bo52 wrote

There may also be a vaccine for multiple sclerosis in our lifetime. And not just the one for EBV (a proposed cause of MS).

So many diseases are either caused by immune processes or prevented by them. It's insane.

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SerialStateLineXer t1_iw6musw wrote

A vaccine is a drug that trains your immune system to attack a particular thing. A flu vaccine trains your immune system to attack flu viruses. A cancer vaccine trains your immune system to attack cancer cells.

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ninja_natalia t1_ivzjmu6 wrote

Cancer vaccines are already undergoing trials with people with cancer! I work with some of them! It's amazing!!!

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pittguy578 t1_ix6ie4o wrote

Any indications it can possibly work on prostate cancers ? I don’t have it but have it on both sides of my family

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ninja_natalia t1_ixein40 wrote

The ones whose patients I've worked with is specifically for a rare form of liver cancer, so no, but that's only because the PI for the study works where I do. I wouldn't be surprised if there are studies for prostate cancer vaccines in the works, I just haven't encountered any.

Edit: probably goes without saying but just in case-- prostate cancer is very screenable, meaning it's quite easy to catch it before its a problem with the tools we have available. If you have a known family history you can probably get them done more frequently for extra precaution too.

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Environmental_Cake97 t1_ivy09t0 wrote

The summary from the paper the article is based on. You basically use it alongside T Cells (which are a type of immune system cell) that can be artificially reprogrammed to target many types of the cancer.

This IV injection is designed to stop the tumor’s unholy minions from suppressing the modified T cells’ cancer eating activity.

That’s a simplification, but it’s the gist of it. If I got anything wrong there I’d appreciate someone pointing it out.

—-

Therapeutic cancer vaccines are designed to increase tumor-specific T cell immunity. However, suppressive mechanisms within the tumor microenvironment (TME) may limit T cell function. Here, we assessed how the route of vaccination alters intratumoral myeloid cells. Using a self-assembling nanoparticle vaccine that links tumor antigen peptides to a Toll-like receptor 7/8 agonist (SNP-7/8a), we treated tumor-bearing mice subcutaneously (SNP-SC) or intravenously (SNP-IV). Both routes generated antigen-specific CD8+ T cells that infiltrated tumors. However, only SNP-IV mediated tumor regression, dependent on systemic type I interferon at the time of boost. Single-cell RNA-sequencing revealed that intratumoral monocytes expressing an immunoregulatory gene signature (Chil3, Anxa2, Wfdc17) were reduced after SNP-IV boost. In humans, the Chil3+ monocyte gene signature is enriched in CD16– monocytes and associated with worse outcomes. Our results show that the generation of tumor-specific CD8+ T cells combined with remodeling of the TME is a promising approach for tumor immunotherapy.

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[deleted] t1_ivwvyze wrote

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DMAN591 t1_ivwy6bq wrote

I'm sure it's offered as an experimental treatment to some terminal patients, with a few caveats and a stack of NDAs and waivers to sign.

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personAAA t1_ivx3pl0 wrote

Cancer is not a death sentence. There are some terminal cancers that killed, but not the majority.

Cancer is a collection of diseases. Some more serious than others.

Prognosis of any cancer varies a lot. The key things are location, tissue of origin, and cancer genotype.

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hurfery t1_ivzf2m7 wrote

Untreated cancer is 100% always a death sentence though, right?

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personAAA t1_iw00vrt wrote

No.

For some cancers, better to just watch and wait than treat them. Don't take the therapy side effects for low grade cancer that is localizing, non to very slow spread, not impacting any function. Monitor the cancer to see if anything changes.

Cancer likelihood increases with age. For a really old patient, very possible to find with advanced imaging small cancers. Not worth treating and those are not going to kill the patient. They are low grade, not impacting function and more of we only founded it due to imaging. Patient is going to die from something else. Patient is going to die with cancer than from it.

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CultCrossPollination t1_ivxedlg wrote

Because we need to know for sure it works in humans. And how much, and in what conditions. Otherwise our application of medicines becomes totally random and divorced from knowledge and will cause unnecessary suffering. It is essential to have minimally a double blind controlled clinical trial with the new treatment to determine the effectiveness.

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Environmental_Cake97 t1_ivy72t8 wrote

I wouldn’t want to be in the placebo arm of this one. Dying anyway? Targets the tumor macro environment to make engineered T cells I’m already getting more effective?

The worst it could do, the very worst, is have the opposite effect of that intended. It’s a risk I’d be happy to take.

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CultCrossPollination t1_ivyqawb wrote

In these kind of clinical trials they always use the standard of care medicine as "negative control". placebo is considered unethical. The patients involved are always considered "end of care", so previous treatments have failed to contain an endless growth of the tumors.

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Rainbow334dr t1_ivyk2xb wrote

You can still do any test you want and have all the studies you want but people who are months away from dying should be able to take the chance. Better than sending them to some witch doctor that has no chance of working.

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ikingrpg t1_ivxdq5c wrote

I mean that's why people sign up for these studies/trials.

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Rainbow334dr t1_ivykwzf wrote

They should be able to get the vaccine not a placebo. How would you like to get the six months to live diagnosis and be told we have an experimental vaccine but we have to save more rats before you can have it.

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[deleted] t1_ivyykug wrote

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personAAA t1_iw03kxk wrote

I agree that this has very small chance to translate directly.

However, we still need to do some preclinical work developing technology. How good a mouse model is for cancers I am sure is debatable.

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zv88909 t1_iw03ouk wrote

One of the biggest issues with these papers is how early they start treating tumors - 7 days after graftment?

For these tumor models, you implant the cells on the back of the mice, and they need time to grow and form an actual robust tumor. 7 days is such little time to do all the things a tumor needs to do: teach the immune system to support it/help it, get blood vessels, build strong local environment to support it etc

7 days is not a great starting point… very early … rather see at least 12-14 days… for at least a more accurate model.

Not just a problem for this paper, problem around the field of cancer models in mice - people start early to make the effect look better.

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lordlaneus t1_ivx7c4j wrote

It's too bad that the nature of medical research means that cancer will be defeated slowly, in a long series of discoveries made over (at minimum) decades, instead of being cured all at once in one big dramatic breakthrough.

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v3ritas1989 t1_ivxcf1i wrote

idk, but the personalized mrna approach of biontec looks more like it could be one big dramatic breakthrough. If it turns out to work for all cancers that is. But through the personalisation approach this is probably already factored in.

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[deleted] t1_ivybww4 wrote

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personAAA t1_iw02vcw wrote

Cancer is treated classically 3 ways: cut, burn, poison. Cut = surgery. Burn = radiation. Poison = chemo.

We now have a fourth way. Different immunotherapies. Those already on the market.

This paper is trying develop another immunotherapy by another mechanism.

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[deleted] t1_ivwuizl wrote

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personAAA t1_ivx0v4w wrote

The mRNA tech had been in development a long time including animal studies.

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[deleted] t1_ivvzljx wrote

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who519 t1_ivw2404 wrote

It is sad that many are sacrificed and often suffer horribly, but if we don't further this research millions of people, dogs, cats, mice, rats, chimps every animal on earth will continue to die of this horrible disease. There is no other way.

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TheArmed501st t1_ivwpzzp wrote

Now i dont really know vaccines and how covid’s vaccines were made but im guessing that humans were involved in testing because you know…theyre already one foot in the grave might as well be a test bed yeah?

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Wide-Dealer-3005 t1_ivxihxa wrote

Human testing is always part of a drug's experimentation. They try it on people whose condition is so severe that there is no approved drug that can cure them

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who519 t1_ivz636n wrote

I think the new "right to try" law, maybe the only good thing Trump ever did as president allows people access to any experimental treatment they want if they are already terminal, which is also good for research...but I don't know the details.

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[deleted] t1_ivw5ap2 wrote

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Visulas t1_ivw6s98 wrote

Depends on the goal. There may be another way to develop a cancer vaccine, but there may not be another way, which saves as many lives.

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Karma_Redeemed t1_ivwf657 wrote

Thought experiment:

Consider the scenario that there isn't another method of conducting these scientific experiments. How many human lives would you sacrifice if it meant saving a lab animal? What's a fair rate of exchange for you? What if you yourself had an incurable, terminal illness that would have been curable if animal testing was available?

I don't mean to imply that one must have all the answers to criticize an injustice, but cheap throw away lines like "There's always another way" or "Not with that attitude" reek of shallow moralizing more concerned with virtue signaling than coherent ethical belief.

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[deleted] t1_ivwuzwf wrote

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J-Dawg_Cookmaster t1_ivweknk wrote

How can we prepare scientific studies to be safe for human trials? I'm not disagreeing but with medical science there's not a lot of ways

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jasongw t1_ivwnxb6 wrote

Unfortunately--and as much as I wish it were otherwise--sometimes there really is only one way. And the reality is that you can't test medicine effectively on non-living things.

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ForeverStaloneKP t1_ivwz4ye wrote

Animal testing is always a weird one. I love animals. I've studied Zoology. I want to be an Ecologist. The thought of animals being born just to be tested on and then euthanised at the end of the study is distressing. However it doesn't change that I probably wouldn't be alive if animal testing didn't exist. You probably wouldn't be alive either. Somewhere in our family tree, someone who benefited from the treatment would have gone without and died.

Given that I'm alive because of animal testing, if I then go on to look after animals, or work in ecology and protect the environment by using my abilities to save and protect more animals, is that a worthy trade off when you extend it to include everyone who works with animals or fields that benefit animals in a positive way? What about people like David Attenborough, who has reached billions with his message of protecting animals and the environment and will continue to do so for generations thanks to film?

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