Therapeutic cancer vaccines – there’s a new kid on the block
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After millions of years of evolution the immune system has more than a few sophisticated tricks up its sleeve
Then there is the question of cost. While $93,000 for three to four months extra survival may not look like a bargain, Provenge is in some ways highly unrepresentative of the field, as it is engineered for each patient individually using whole cells taken from their tumour. By contrast, most of the therapeutic cancer vaccines that are likely to enter the market in coming years will be ‘off the shelf’, with many targeted at antigens such as MUC-1 and MAGE-A3 that are present across a wide spectrum of cancers. The potential for pushing down costs in these cases is clear.
... The next approvals are widely expected to be in non-small-cell lung cancer and lymphoma. Melanoma vaccines have continued to disappoint, although there are now hopes that they may be more effective in combination with low-dose chemotherapy, says Dalgleish.
...The wrong stage As with cancer drugs, the early vaccine trials tended to be in very late-stage disease, but experience has shown that vaccines struggle to have any impact in this setting. With vaccines, it will always be the earlier the better, says Dalgleish
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