Cancer vaccine

This article is about therapeutic cancer vaccines. For preventive cancer vaccine, see Cancer immunoprevention.

A cancer vaccine, or oncovaccine, is a vaccine that either treats existing cancer or prevents development of cancer.[1] Vaccines that treat existing cancer are known as therapeutic cancer vaccines or tumor antigen vaccines. Some of the vaccines are "autologous", being prepared from samples taken from the patient, and are specific to that patient.

Some researchers claim that cancerous cells routinely arise and are destroyed by the immune system (immunosurveillance);[2] and that tumors form when the immune system fails to destroy them.[3]

Some types of cancer, such as cervical cancer and liver cancer, are caused by viruses (oncoviruses). Traditional vaccines against those viruses, such as the HPV vaccine[4] and the hepatitis B vaccine, prevent those types of cancer. Other cancers are to some extent caused by bacterial infections (e.g. stomach cancer and Helicobacter pylori[5]). Traditional vaccines against cancer-causing bacteria (oncobacteria) are not further discussed in this article.

  1. ^ Kwok M, Fritsch EF, Wu CJ (January 2021). "Cancer and COVID-19: On the Quest for Effective Vaccines". Blood Cancer Discovery. 2 (1): 13–18. doi:10.1158/2643-3230.BCD-20-0205. PMC 8500734. PMID 34661150.
  2. ^ Shankaran V, Ikeda H, Bruce AT, White JM, Swanson PE, Old LJ, Schreiber RD (April 2001). "IFNgamma and lymphocytes prevent primary tumour development and shape tumour immunogenicity". Nature. 410 (6832): 1107–1111. Bibcode:2001Natur.410.1107S. doi:10.1038/35074122. PMID 11323675. S2CID 205016599.
  3. ^ Dunn GP, Old LJ, Schreiber RD (2004). "The three Es of cancer immunoediting". Annual Review of Immunology. 22 (i): 329–360. doi:10.1146/annurev.immunol.22.012703.104803. PMID 15032581.
  4. ^ Babu RA, Kumar KK, Reddy GS, Anuradha C (2010). "Cancer Vaccine : A Review". Journal of Orofacial Sciences. 2 (3): 77–82. doi:10.4103/0975-8844.103507 (inactive 1 November 2024). S2CID 68256825.{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: DOI inactive as of November 2024 (link)
  5. ^ "Oral vaccine could fight source of stomach cancers". Vaccine News Reports. Archived from the original on 24 April 2015. Retrieved 22 June 2010.