The world’s first ovarian cancer vaccine could wipe the disease out, researchers have said.

OvarianVax is a vaccine that teaches the immune system to recognise and attack the earliest stages of ovarian cancer.

It’s being developed by scientists at the University of Oxford.

The hope is that women could receive the jab preventatively on the NHS with the goal of eradicating the disease.

Experts have suggested it could work in a similar way to the human papillomavirus (HPV) jab, which is on track to stamp out cervical cancer.

  • PlantJam@lemmy.world
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    2 months ago

    While the “full-blown timeline” for the vaccine being approved “might be many years away” the visible impact could be sooner.

    Professor Ahmed added that, through clinical trials, he would hope to start seeing the vaccine’s impact “in four or five years on the healthy population”.

    This is really exciting. I wonder if vaccines could be developed for other cancers using a similar technique?

    • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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      2 months ago

      They will establish which proteins on the surface of early-stage ovarian cancer cells are best recognised by the immune system and how effectively the vaccine kills models of the disease in a lab.

      Sounds like it would to me. Between this and mRNA vaccines, there’s a lot of promise out there.

  • Samvega@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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    2 months ago

    This is great news. Yet, sadly, I am drawn to wondering who will complain about this the loudest. Will it be misogynists who say “they’re not helping men with their cancer”, or anti-vaxxers saying “this vaccine will actually CAUSE cancer”?

    What about people who are both misogynist and anti-vaccine?

    • lmaydev@lemmy.world
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      2 months ago

      Fuck em, essentially. Rather have cancer than a vaccine, that’s their choice. It’s not until it’s a required vaccine that it makes much difference.

    • edric@lemm.ee
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      2 months ago

      Well at least ovarian cancer isn’t airborne and contagious like covid. So antivaxxers can avoid it all they want, it’s their choice if they want to die from a disease that they could’ve prevented.

    • rebelsimile@sh.itjust.works
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      2 months ago

      It’s a good thing we invented this straw person to have this whole discussion artificially when literally no one else was bringing it up. If we can’t find any monsters I guess we’ll invent them and do it anyway. 🙄

    • Viking_Hippie@lemmy.world
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      2 months ago

      What about people who are both misogynist and anti-vaccine?

      $10 says Alex Jones and his troglodyte cult following are gonna have a field day 😮‍💨

    • ripcord@lemmy.world
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      2 months ago

      Yeah, I knew it. Here come the sad sacks with the useless “this is good news, but…”

      • Samvega@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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        2 months ago

        I’m an academic working to analyse hate speech, with a particular focus on online misogyny. As bigotry is illogical, common features of communications of that hatred is stuff that is wholly made up. This include the idea that men are being short-changed by a medical industry which prioritise female health. This is factually untrue, in terms of gender differences in health outcomes.

        If knowing about the truth makes me a ‘sad sack’, fine. Maybe being correct and ‘sad’ is more important than being incorrect yet happy.

  • JATth@lemmy.world
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    2 months ago

    The billions that got pumped into vaxine research… The mRNA method has received a nobel prize. Before this we had no good way (or as safe) to pre-train the immune system to “if you see this (virus, etc.) again, raise the alarms”. Now we do.

    Edit: updated the wording a bit.

    • wrishafffal@lemmy.world
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      Katalin Karikó and Drew Weissman won the 2023 Nobel Prize in Medicine for their work on RNA leading to the COVID-19 vaccines (from Moderna and Pfizer)

  • mlg@lemmy.world
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    2 months ago

    This is some pretty cool research but I already can’t wait to see the 100k per vaccine price in the USA lmao.

  • umbrella@lemmy.ml
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    2 months ago

    is this the kind of thing we will never hear about anymore, or is it legit?

    • Phoenixz@lemmy.ca
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      2 months ago

      Well, this is cancer and not some virus so at least they’ll only slowly kill themselves after suffering, if they were to have to deal with this. It’s not great, but silver linings, I guess?

      • JaggedRobotPubes@lemmy.world
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        2 months ago

        It actually completely reverses the dynamic. Anti-vaxxers are bioterrorists because most stuff you vaccinate against is contagious. It’s assaulting a public health superstructure that everybody relies on.

        But when they only kill themselves? 🍺🍺

        Only leftover awful thing is doing it to their poor kids. Still every bit as evil, just with a massive reduction in scope.

        Far, far more than a silver lining.

  • Venia Silente@lemm.ee
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    2 months ago

    “could wipe the disease out”

    …“but won’t, because thanks to Capitalism it will be non-affordable.”