PATIENTS with advanced lung or skin cancer who received a COVID mRNA vaccine within 100 days of starting immunotherapy drugs lived significantly longer than those who did not get the vaccine, according to US research published in Nature.
After analysing than 1,000 patient records, it appeared the vaccine helped to create strong immune responses, even in patients where this was not expected to occur.
In patients with lung cancer, getting the vaccine was linked with a near doubling of median survival, from 20.6 months to 37.3 months, while the median survival for patients with metastatic melanoma increased from 26.7 months to a range of 30 to 40 months and possibly more.
Assoc Prof Seth Cheetham, Deputy Director of the BASE mRNA Facility at the University of Queensland, suggested this may happen due to mRNA vaccines quickly "waking up" the immune system, with animal models showing that this surge helps prime cancer-fighting immune cells which infiltrated tumours.
"Researchers have been developing personalised mRNA cancer vaccines which use molecules from tumours to better teach the immune system to recognise and destroy cancer cells," said Assoc Prof Cheetham, who was not involved with the study.
"However, while this personalised approach appears highly effective in early clinical studies, it is currently expensive and logistically challenging," he continued.
"This new study points to a practical, inexpensive way to increase treatment effectiveness with an existing mRNA vaccine."
However, he cautioned that the study findings were retrospective and only showed association, not causation, and controlled trials were needed.
"If these confirmatory trials are successful, doctors may soon have an unexpected powerful new option for treating cancer," he said.
The paper is available HERE.
Meanwhile, updated COVID vaccines are still providing effective protection against infection, emergency department visits, hospitalisation and death, according to US research published today.
The new study shows that the 2024-25 COVID vaccines provide similar protection to the previous formulation, with the researchers anticipating the 2025-26 vaccines, which target similar omicron subvariants as the 2024-25 vaccines, to have similar effectiveness.
The researchers said they were most protective four weeks after vaccination with effectiveness waning over time, highlighting the importance of annual vaccination. KB
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