Ovarian cancer: The first vaccine is being prepared – will it eliminate the disease?

In the United Kingdom the first vaccine worldwide is developed to prevent ovarian cancer that could save many lives, eliminating the disease.

University of Oxford scientists create OvarianVax, a vaccine that teaches the immune system to recognize and attack early stages of ovarian cancer. Aim to be given to women preventively to NHS in order to eliminate the disease, which kills about 4,100 women in the United Kingdom every year.

The vaccine could save women from changing the BRCA gene and removing their ovaries.

Experts have compared the potential impact of OvarianVax with that of the HPV vaccine, which is on its way to eliminating cervical cancer reports the Independent’s report.

According to Professor Ahmed Ahmed, director of the Ovarian Cells Laboratory at the MRC Weatherall Institute of Molecular Medicine, University of Oxford, patients in clinical trials could benefit within four to five years, although it will take “many years” to give the vaccine for general use. Professor Ahmed stated that, if the vaccine is successful, he would expect to start seeing impact within the next five years.

” While the full timetable” for the approval of a vaccine “may be many years away”, the “impact it will have, if successful, we hope it will be much earlier” said features.

It is known that women with BRCA mutation, such as actress Angelina Jolie, are at high risk and it is currently recommended that those with the gene remove their ovaries. Professor Ahmed stated that those carrying a BRCA mutation could benefit significantly from the new vaccine, because “they wouldn’t then have to remove their ovaries”. Dr. Claire Bromley, research information officer at Cancer Research UK, told the Independent that while it will take “many years” to make a vaccine readily available to the general population, the study marks progress towards cancer prevention.

” A few decades ago, the idea of a cancer vaccine was science fiction. Many of these vaccines are based on the technology developed during Covid-19, which accelerated this work. We move on to a sector where cancer as a disease could be predicted,” he said.