President Vladimir Putin announced on Wednesday that Russian researchers were getting close to creating cancer vaccines that patients could potentially get in the near future.
Putin said in television-broadcast remarks that “we have come very close to the creation of so-called cancer vaccines and immunomodulatory drugs of a new generation.” At a Moscow forum on future technologies, he went on, “I hope that soon they will be effectively used as methods of individual therapy.”
Putin did not specify which types of cancer the proposed vaccines would target, nor how. A number of countries and companies are working on cancer vaccines. Last year the UK government signed an agreement with Germany-based BioNTech to launch clinical trials providing “personalised cancer treatments”, aiming to reach 10,000 patients by 2030.
An experimental cancer vaccine being developed by Moderna and Merck & Co. was shown in a mid-stage study to cut the risk of melanoma, the deadliest kind of skin cancer, in half after three years of treatment.
The human papillomavirus (HPV) is the cause of many cancers, including cervical cancer. The World Health Organization lists six vaccines against HPV that are currently approved. Furthermore, vaccinations are available to prevent liver cancer caused by hepatitis B virus (HBV).
During the coronavirus pandemic, Russia developed its own Sputnik V vaccine against COVID-19 and sold it to a number of countries, although domestically it ran up against widespread public reluctance to get vaccinated. Putin himself said he had taken Sputnik, in a bid to assure people of its efficacy and safety.
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