Merck-Moderna mRNA Cancer Vaccine Slows Melanoma Recurrence in Late-Stage Trial
Merck and Moderna announced that their personalized mRNA cancer vaccine intismeran, combined with Keytruda, slowed melanoma recurrence in a late-stage trial. It is the first randomized Phase 3 trial to prove the benefit of neoantigen vaccines.
A personalized mRNA cancer vaccine, added to an existing treatment, slowed the return of melanoma and its spread to other parts of the body in a late-stage clinical trial, the drugmakers Merck and Moderna announced Wednesday, results that could herald a new, powerful approach in oncology. So-called “neoantigen” vaccines have long been seen as having potential as cancer treatments, but this is the first randomized Phase 3 clinical trial aimed at definitively proving their benefit. In this case the personalized vaccine, intismeran, was combined with Merck’s Keytruda in adjuvant melanoma, meaning patients’ disease had been surgically removed.
The trial was conducted among patients with adjuvant melanoma—that is, those whose tumors had been surgically removed. The study used the personalized vaccine intismeran in combination with Keytruda, a drug developed by Merck. The drugmakers did not immediately release detailed data. If the results hold up, they could deliver new hope and potentially longer lives for patients, and could be a further testament to the power of mRNA as a platform to develop both traditional vaccines and therapeutics.
At the American Society of Clinical Oncology scientific meeting in Chicago, researchers reported that patients who received an experimental Moderna mRNA-based vaccine along with Merck’s immunotherapy Keytruda following surgery for melanoma had a dramatically lower risk of recurrence five years later compared to patients who got the drug alone. They tested the vaccine, called intismeran, in a mid-stage trial in combination with Keytruda in 107 patients. Another 50 patients received only Keytruda.