seems like Covid might end up having a WWII like impact on some technologies. Tons of accelerated R&D triggered by a massive crisis. Would be nice if we could salvage something good out of a bad situation
This is not the same thing as the BioNTech/ModeRNA treatment. This is gene therapy on T-cells. The mRNA is used here to produce a functional protein within the T-cells themselves, not a protein to recognize and attack.
Its insane how powerful and complex the immune system is, it is nowhere nearly fully understood. It can fire against anything detected to be hostile, false alarms causing auto immune diseases. Being able to take snippets of something, e.g. any cancera person gets and telling it "fight" would be the holy grail :)
Not trying to be cheeky: How many millions of citizens here in the U.S. will abstain from a potential cancer vaccine if based off this research? Would the same religious/tribal objections be held, for example, if the disease to be prevented was cancer vs a virus of unknown origin? Would it still be viewed by so many as a political/big-pharma conspiracy ("But where did the cancer come from?" etc.)?
I think that's less problematic as you can't infect someone with cancer if you have it. But my guess is you are right. Although I will say that suspicious people are occasionally right. Trusting science has a proven track record, but it doesn't have a 100% shooting percentage, so I would be ok with not having a debate there.
If it demonstrably cures diagnosed cancer I think most people will not hesitate, especially for cancers that have a high mortality and/or few other treatment options.
If it's proposed as a vaccine for cancer that you don't have yet, there would be more hesitancy.
"that parental intent not to vaccinate their adolescents against HPV rose from 50.4 percent in 2012 to 64 percent in 2018. Many parents resisted the vaccine despite their doctors’ recommendations, Dr. Sonawane said. Ironically, parents were most resistant — at 68.1 percent — to vaccinating girls, the very group for whom this vaccine was initially developed to prevent cervical cancer."
People have a belief that they can just tough out COVID, and so the vaccine is a long-term-risk tradeoff: suffer unknown side-effects of the vaccine, or maybe die of this disease that my friend had and recovered from?
This immunotherapy is cotemporal with "traditional" immunological and chemo treatments, so the mortality calculus is different: "Suffer potential unknown side-effects of an mRNA therapy or content myself with that 'three months' number the doctor gave me?"
> Not trying to be cheeky: How many millions of citizens here in the U.S. will abstain from a potential cancer vaccine if based off this research? Would the same religious/tribal objections be held, for example, if the disease to be prevented was cancer vs a virus of unknown origin? Would it still be viewed by so many as a political/big-pharma conspiracy ("But where did the cancer come from?" etc.)?
So this misses the full Covid-19 vaccine critique and provides a disturbing slant instead of the proposed hazards. The specific critique is that the protein chosen in C19 vaccines is in fact dangerous in its own right.
mRNA as a mechanism of delivering a protein to the body is anything but an empirical debate -- the tech works, and works decently well for risk profiles who have no other option. The philosophical / duty of care debate is whether or not the risks associated with mRNA therapies / vaccines are worth the inherent risks.
Equating Covid 19 for the common person as the same as cancer for the common person doesn't appear to balance. If C19 had cancer mortality rates, this pandemic would look drastically different -- with far few people in the room.
I tend to think the abstinence rate would be much lower than with the vaccine.
Cancer scares people in a way that COVID doesn't.
Many of the anti-vaxxers do not perceive COVID as a credible risk, so they let their contrarian/anti-authoritarian/"don't tell me what to do" instincts kick in, because none of it actually matters to them in their mind.
When faced with a form of cancer that has a <10% survival rate they will shut up and take the mRNA treatment in a heartbeat.
I personally don't know anyone that abstains from MMR/polio/chickenpox vaccines. I think this whole anti-anti-vaxxer meme has really got people riled up and ignoring just how many people are already taking vaccines. over 92% of kids have 3 doses of polio vaccine by the time they're 24 months according to the CDC. Something tells me that number gets much higher with just another year or two.
It's a sad day for honest debate when being skeptical of an item gets you labeled as being "anti" an entire category of things to which that item belongs.
To be clear I don't think your question is expressly stating that anti-vaxxers are a big concern, but if there's a genuine concern that a vaccine is well established to work, an incredibly large majority of people take it in the U.S. so I don't think the concern is warranted.
People turn to pseudo-scientific stuff as a last resort (or the only) as well, so I would not necessarily say they would not get the vaccine if it might be their last hope.
1. This is article is describing a therapy, not prevention. Your sensibilities will be influenced if you already have a deadly illness.
2. This would be a choice and not a mandate, like chemotherapy is today. Or at least I imagine it would be.
I'm sure many anti vaxxers who've died from covid would've accepted the vaccine on their death beds if it improved their chances of fighting the disease at that point.
It depends 100% on if the conservative media and figureheads like Trump think they can make hay out of turning any given medical treatment into a way to oppose liberals. Let's hope they can't.
As someone who is very anti-COVID vaccinations, my problem with it isn't the vaccine itself or the underlying technology so much as it's been the plethora of other issues associated with it. The normal processes for drug approval were bypassed and so as a result we have very limited safety data and no long-term >5yr safety data at all.
With something like this, I would expect it to go through those trials and see that we'd have some sort of safety data and further research.
Again, I am actually very positive about mRNA therapies—I just want them to be fully tested and vetted first.
I hope so! ~50% of people in a developed country get cancer within their lifetime and they cost our healthcare system the most (other than, err, very sick elderly people).
If this works safely and reliably, then this is like doubling or 5x'ing our healthcare budget over 5 years.
I wouldn't mind if people could opt-out of mRNA cancer treatment, but then they have to pay for every other cancer treatment option (and all doctor visits) out of pocket.
I think the news is the fact that a non-profit, non-affiliated (w/ Moderna) organization has additional supporting evidence for mRNA therapy for cancer patients who weren't responding to treatment otherwise.
Not every piece of news needs to shake the world to the core.
it could be that this is public research vs private?
It's quite exciting to see this scientific discovery having such widespread use, don't you agree? The research is around the [NKG7 protein][1], not sure what Moderna targets.
My thoughts exactly. According to the Moderna pipeline [0], they're already on phase II trials for their cancer vaccine, which to me seems much more exciting than a proof-of-concept if that's what this is.
[+] [-] ren_engineer|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] FredPret|4 years ago|reply
Hunger, sabre-tooth tigers, malaria, war: everything seems to make civilization stronger in the end
[+] [-] tonmoy|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] throwawaymanbot|4 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] cblconfederate|4 years ago|reply
I think the most important takeaway from the pandemic is that accelerated phase 2/3 trials will become the norm
[+] [-] jl2718|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] go_elmo|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] airstrike|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] throwawayboise|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] allemagne|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] erickhill|4 years ago|reply
Cynical me says it would.
[+] [-] locallost|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] throwawayboise|4 years ago|reply
If it's proposed as a vaccine for cancer that you don't have yet, there would be more hesitancy.
[+] [-] acomjean|4 years ago|reply
[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/13/well/live/hpv-vaccine-chi...
"that parental intent not to vaccinate their adolescents against HPV rose from 50.4 percent in 2012 to 64 percent in 2018. Many parents resisted the vaccine despite their doctors’ recommendations, Dr. Sonawane said. Ironically, parents were most resistant — at 68.1 percent — to vaccinating girls, the very group for whom this vaccine was initially developed to prevent cervical cancer."
https://www.cdc.gov/hpv/parents/vaccine-for-hpv.html
When in a doctors office with a cancer diagnosis, people will take it.
[+] [-] shadowgovt|4 years ago|reply
This immunotherapy is cotemporal with "traditional" immunological and chemo treatments, so the mortality calculus is different: "Suffer potential unknown side-effects of an mRNA therapy or content myself with that 'three months' number the doctor gave me?"
[+] [-] anonymouse008|4 years ago|reply
So this misses the full Covid-19 vaccine critique and provides a disturbing slant instead of the proposed hazards. The specific critique is that the protein chosen in C19 vaccines is in fact dangerous in its own right.
mRNA as a mechanism of delivering a protein to the body is anything but an empirical debate -- the tech works, and works decently well for risk profiles who have no other option. The philosophical / duty of care debate is whether or not the risks associated with mRNA therapies / vaccines are worth the inherent risks.
Equating Covid 19 for the common person as the same as cancer for the common person doesn't appear to balance. If C19 had cancer mortality rates, this pandemic would look drastically different -- with far few people in the room.
[+] [-] bkjelden|4 years ago|reply
Cancer scares people in a way that COVID doesn't.
Many of the anti-vaxxers do not perceive COVID as a credible risk, so they let their contrarian/anti-authoritarian/"don't tell me what to do" instincts kick in, because none of it actually matters to them in their mind.
When faced with a form of cancer that has a <10% survival rate they will shut up and take the mRNA treatment in a heartbeat.
[+] [-] kevin_b_er|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] toolz|4 years ago|reply
It's a sad day for honest debate when being skeptical of an item gets you labeled as being "anti" an entire category of things to which that item belongs.
To be clear I don't think your question is expressly stating that anti-vaxxers are a big concern, but if there's a genuine concern that a vaccine is well established to work, an incredibly large majority of people take it in the U.S. so I don't think the concern is warranted.
[+] [-] johnisgood|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] disambiguation|4 years ago|reply
1. This is article is describing a therapy, not prevention. Your sensibilities will be influenced if you already have a deadly illness.
2. This would be a choice and not a mandate, like chemotherapy is today. Or at least I imagine it would be.
I'm sure many anti vaxxers who've died from covid would've accepted the vaccine on their death beds if it improved their chances of fighting the disease at that point.
[+] [-] unknown|4 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] standardUser|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nvahalik|4 years ago|reply
With something like this, I would expect it to go through those trials and see that we'd have some sort of safety data and further research.
Again, I am actually very positive about mRNA therapies—I just want them to be fully tested and vetted first.
[+] [-] NullPrefix|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] newsbinator|4 years ago|reply
If this works safely and reliably, then this is like doubling or 5x'ing our healthcare budget over 5 years.
I wouldn't mind if people could opt-out of mRNA cancer treatment, but then they have to pay for every other cancer treatment option (and all doctor visits) out of pocket.
[+] [-] xiphias2|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ziddoap|4 years ago|reply
Not every piece of news needs to shake the world to the core.
[+] [-] laura2013|4 years ago|reply
It's quite exciting to see this scientific discovery having such widespread use, don't you agree? The research is around the [NKG7 protein][1], not sure what Moderna targets.
[1]: https://cancerimmunolres.aacrjournals.org/content/early/2021...
[+] [-] smrk007|4 years ago|reply
[0]: https://www.modernatx.com/pipeline
[+] [-] onychomys|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Leader2light|4 years ago|reply
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