Putin says Russia is on the verge of developing breakthrough cancer vaccine

Russian scientists are close to developing a cancer vaccine that will soon be available to patients, President Vladimir Putin said on Wednesday.

“We are very close to developing a so-called new generation of cancer vaccines and immunomodulatory drugs,” Putin said in a televised address. “I hope they will soon be effectively used as individual treatments,” he added, speaking at the Future Technologies Forum in Moscow.

Putin did not specify which type of cancer the proposed vaccine would target, or how. Many countries and companies are working on cancer vaccines. Last year, the British government signed an agreement with Germany’s BioNTech to launch clinical trials to provide “personalized cancer treatments” with the goal of covering 10,000 patients by 2030.

An experimental cancer vaccine being developed by pharmaceutical companies Moderna and Merck cuts in half the chance of recurrence or death from melanoma, the deadliest form of skin cancer, after three years of treatment, a mid-stage study shows.

According to the World Health Organization, there are currently six licensed vaccines against human papillomavirus (HPV), as well as hepatitis B (HBV), which can cause liver cancer. HPV can cause a variety of cancers, including cervical cancer.

During the coronavirus pandemic, Russia developed its own Sputnik V vaccine against COVID-19 and sold it to many countries, although at home it encountered widespread public reluctance to get vaccinated. Putin himself said that he used Sputnik to reassure people of its effectiveness and safety.

(This story has not been edited by News18 staff and is published from a Yonhap news agency feed – Reuters)