Personalized cancer vaccine reduces remissions by 44%

What's the news: Personalized cancer vaccines keep more patients cancer-free.

Why should we believe it: This news was announced only a few days ago at American Association for Cancer Research’s annual meeting by representatives of two pharma giants, Moderna and Merck. According to the release:

• 62% of melanoma patients who received the immunotherapy drug Keytruda stayed cancer free for 18 months

• That number rose to 79% for melanoma patients who also received a personalized cancer vaccine

Why this is a big deal: Melanoma is one of the most deadly cancers. The addition of a cancer vaccine to standard care reduced remission by almost 45%, which could save tens of thousands of lives every year. What's more, if this cancer vaccine truly does end up delivering as the pharma companies claim, it might lead to similar life-saving treatments for other types of cancers.

So what specifically can you do now: It's important to highlight the present news comes not from a published scientific study, but is based on internal work done at two pharma companies.

The pharma companies will now push for a Phase 3 study — a large-scale study done in a clinical setting — to have a chance to prove their vaccine truly works as they claim, and to turn it into a therapy that is rolled out to cancer patients worldwide.

If you're looking for an experimental melanoma treatment, it might be worth investigating how to join the Merck and Moderna study when it does begin. On the other hand, if you're just curious about human health and longevity breakthroughs, then stay tuned to Long Youthspan, because if there are developments to this story, I'll be the first to let you know.