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SAN ANTONIO (June 30, 2021) In a U.S. and Swiss study, nearly all patients with cancer developed good immune response to the COVID-19 mRNA vaccines three to four weeks after receiving their second dose, but the fact that a small group of the patients exhibited no response raised questions about how their protection against the virus will be addressed moving forward.
Among the 131 patients studied, 94% developed antibodies to the coronavirus. Seven high-risk patients did not. We could not find any antibodies against the virus in those patients, said Dimpy P. Shah, MD, PhD, of the Mays Cancer Center, home to UT Health San Antonio MD Anderson. That has implications for the future. Should we provide a third dose of vaccine after cancer therapy has completed in certain high-risk patients?
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Immunotherapy techniques developed in oncology to combat cancerous cells have great potential for fighting viruses. A research team from the University Hospitals of Geneva (HUG) and the University of Geneva (UNIGE), in Switzerland, in collaboration with MaxiVAX, a spinoff of both institutions, developed an innovative technology called “cell encapsulation”. Originally designed to stimulate immunity to fight cancer, the COVID-19 pandemic motivated the scientists to broaden the scope of their technology to test its effectiveness against viruses. The first results of a pre-clinical study are very encouraging and can be discovered in the journal Vaccines.
The immune system is able to identify cancer cells and fight them, just as it does against a viral or bacterial pathogen. Researchers therefore rely on this to develop vaccines against cancer. “To develop an effective vaccine, two elements are needed: a target recognized by the immune system, such as cells, proteins, DNA or