The Claire Byrne Show
A personalized vaccine for skin cancer shows promise at clinical trial stage
02 Jun 2026
Transcript generated automatically by AI and may contain errors.
Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
The Clare Byrne Show on Newstalk. With Aviva Insurance. First this morning, a personalised vaccine for skin cancer could cut the risk of it returning after five years. Here to tell me more is Orla Dolan, who's CEO of Breakthrough Cancer Research. Good morning, Orla. Good morning, Clare. So there is a big conference happening in the United States at the moment.
And yesterday at the American Society of Clinical Oncology's annual meeting, the results of this trial were announced and there has been a lot of excitement at what has happened. Tell us a little bit about it, firstly.
Chapter 2: What is the promise of personalized vaccines for skin cancer?
Yeah, I mean, ASCO is this time of year where I think everybody brings their best results out. What you're hearing is the five year results of a trial in people with stage three melanoma. And what they really saw was that they were able to, with a new vaccine based on an mRNA vaccine, And I think the general public in Ireland are probably familiar with mRNA vaccines during COVID.
We were all given them as part of the vaccine strategy for that. But what is unique about this approach is that it's personalised East patient. So while in the mRNA vaccine that was given to us during COVID, it was the same antigen or the same target for everybody.
In this, what was unique and makes it really landmark is that they were able to sequence a person's normal DNA and then also their tumor DNA and then using a sophisticated algorithm, identify 34 targets that they would prime the immune system to go after and give our immune system a blueprint to go after that person's individual cancer. And that's why they saw such amazing results.
When we talk about vaccines, we're generally talking about a vaccine that might target the general population. This is very much personalised medicine, isn't it?
It is. It is. And I think, you know, now we have the technology to be more sophisticated in designing these things. And what you really saw was it would be to each individual person. So to people who get cancer, it's a buildup of mutations over time and each individual is different.
And so what they're doing here is they're using this advanced technology to sequence the difference between the two. Look for things that are definitely cancer causing targets and then say this is that patient's cancer causing targets. This is 34 of them. Look at those and go after those. And what they do with the vaccine is they also give an immunotherapy at the same time.
So they're boosting the immune system at the same time and then basically giving him a roadmap to say, that's what I want you to go after. And that's what makes it so, so amazing.
And the study that they have done, and it is a small one. I know there's a bigger one underway at the moment that they're gathering results from. But this smaller one, the patients went through cancer treatment with everything that we are familiar with. And then they were given the vaccine afterwards. That's how it worked.
Yeah, so the standard of care for, these were all patients who were stage three, so they had advanced disease and surgery would have been the first thing they would normally have and then an immunotherapy.
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Chapter 3: How does the new mRNA vaccine differ from traditional vaccines?
I think if they show true in the next stage of that trial, this will come sooner rather than later.
Well, that's a really interesting point, because often as well with research like this, we hear about it and we're told now we've got a long way to go. You're saying because that phase three trial is done and they're collating the results, that this could move at pace.
Yes. You know, I mean, if you look at what they what the team we're talking about is that they're literally at the data analysis stage now where they'll have compared it to standard of care. And if it's if it holds true, which, you know, all the rumblings are very good, then it should you know, they'll have to go to the FDA, which is another step. But it's not that far out there.
The thing about ASCO, though, is they've produced a lot of amazing data. There was another one about pancreatic cancer. And I do think people should remember that the results they're presenting today probably started in research five or 10 years ago. So we do still have to fund research because that's a pipeline. And then we get these exciting days, you know, five or 10 years out.
OK, but just tell us what was said about pancreatic cancer. Is this the pill that I was reading about over the weekend that targets the growth of the tumours?
Yeah, so it looked like they saw a 20% shift in survival there, which for pancreatic cancer is amazing because we all know pancreatic cancer is a really poor prognosis or low survival cancer and doesn't really have a lot of options. And so it got a standing ovation. And I think to have over 1,200 oncologists standing on their feet, it tells you how excited they were. So
So, look, I think in pancreatic cancer and other cancers, there's a lot of things coming out now, the culmination of years of research. And it's an exciting time to be hearing about them and knowing these things are coming for the patients who need them.
The conversation then, Orla, moves to funding these treatments, doesn't it? And proving in an Irish context that it works, that it has viability and that the gains outweigh the cost.
Yeah, I mean, that is a challenge for more of the modern treatments, particularly biological ones, because if they're individualised, it does require a certain amount of sophistication in the background and they are costly. But not all of them are. And the prices of those things are coming down.
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