A new emerging study shows that COVID-19 mRNA vaccines like Pfizer and Moderna shots may help fight cancerous tumours by reviving the immune system.
Researchers from the MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston and the University of Florida claim that people battling with advanced lung or skin cancer, who were under certain immunotherapy drugs lived substantially longer if they also received a Pfizer or Moderna shot within 100 days of starting treatment.
The findings revealed that the molecule that powers those specific vaccines, mRNA, has been shown to help the immune system respond better to the cutting-edge cancer treatment.
The study lead, Dr. Adam Grippin of MD Anderson, told the media, the vaccine "acts like a siren to activate immune cells throughout the body...We're sensitizing immune-resistant tumours to immune therapy."
Although the US Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy has previously raised scepticism about mRNA vaccines, which resulted in cutting 500 million dollars funding for some uses of the technology. The new findings by a team of researchers at MD Anderson Cancer Center, show a promising result.
Scientists are now preparing a more rigorous study to analyze further whether mRNA coronavirus vaccines must be paired with cancer drugs called checkpoint inhibitors, an interim step while new mRNA vaccines are being prepared for use in cancer.
mRNA, also known as Messenger RNA, is a type of molecule that is found naturally in every cell that carries genetic instructions for our bodies to make proteins. While best known as the Nobel Prize-winning technology behind COVID-19 vaccines, scientists have long been trying to create personalized mRNA "treatment vaccines" that train immune cells to spot unique features of a patient's tumour.
Commenting on the new findings, Dr. Jeff Coller, an mRNA specialist at Johns Hopkins University, says that the new research offers "a very good clue." He continued, "What it shows is that mRNA medicines are continuing to surprise us in how beneficial they can be to human health."
