Vaccine against breast cancer

IT’S LOOKING more and more promising as the successful animal-tested breast cancer vaccine moves on to human trials.

Prof Vincent K. Tuohy, an immunologist and researcher in the department of immunology at the Cleveland Clinic’s Lerner Research Institute, and his team supported by the National Cancer Institute, have been studying "the possibility of a vaccine that would protect women from breast cancer".

The American researchers recently published their findings in the online as well as the print edition of the journal Nature Medicine, showing that a breast cancer vaccine to target women aged 40 and above and those with a high risk of the disease could be just a few years away.

"Most attempts at cancer vaccines have targeted viruses, or cancers that have already developed," said Dr Joseph Crowe, director of Cleveland Clinic’s Breast Centre.

The vaccine works very differently from the two US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved vaccines for both cervical and lung targeting viruses, namely the human papillomavirus (HPV) and Hepatitis B respectively.

It is designed to target a-lactalbumin, a protein present in most breast cancers and breast milk and should "rev up a woman’s immune system to target a-lactalbumin – thus stopping tumour formation – without damaging healthy breast tissue", according to a Lerner Research Institute announcement.

The Swedish researchers had also found that ‘HAMLET’ (Human a-lactalbumin Made LEtal to Tumour cells) kills 40 different types of cancers and explained their findings to a Swedish national radio station, SR- Sveriges Radio.

"Dr Tuohy is not a breast cancer researcher, he’s an immunologist, so his approach is completely different – attacking the tumour before it can develop. It’s a simple concept, yet one that has not been explored until now," added Crowe.

Human trials will begin in 2011 and the goal, if successful, is to vaccinate women over the age of 40 since breast cancer risk increases after 40 and avoid preventative mastectomies.

This breakthrough research taking place in the US, Europe and Singapore can quickly save numerous lives as HAMLET has also been tested on bladder cancer with current studies looking at skin cancer and brain tumours. – AFP-Relaxnews

from Sun2surf