The cancer vaccine has achieved its first success. Uğur Şahin and Özlem Türeci, co-founders of BioNTech, have announced that their cancer vaccine has succeeded in stopping tumor growth and reducing its size.
Clinical trials have included a group of 44 cancer patients, in whom a 30% reduction in tumor size was observed in at least 59% of cases.
The results were made public at the Congress of the European Society for Medical Oncology (ESMO) held in Madrid, Hurriyet Daily reports.
In 95 percent of cases, the cancer stabilized and stopped progressing after vaccination. However, during the administration of the vaccine, some participants experienced a dose-dependent increase in inflammatory reactions, with side effects such as decreased blood pressure and elevated body temperature. These were observed in 23 individuals. The vaccine that the two founders of BioNTech have been working on for 15 years is expected to treat around 10,000 cancer patients by 2030.
Meanwhile, new drugs are being tested for the treatment of lung, pancreatic and colon cancer. The pair of Turkish scientists became known around the globe with the mRNA vaccine they developed shortly after the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.