A vaccine designed to protect against breast cancer is expected to be tested on women within the next two years.
It has been tested on mice and results suggest that it could prevent tumours appearing and attack those that are already present. If tests on women show similar results, it could be offered to women around the age of 40, when the risk of developing the disease rises.
Researchers hope that it will kill off up to 70 per cent of breast cancers and save more than 8,000 lives a year in Britain. Vincent Tuohy, an immunologist who developed the vaccine at the Cleveland Clinic in Ohio, said: “We truly believe that a preventive breast cancer vaccine will do to breast cancer what the polio vaccine has done to polio. We think that it will provide substantial protection. Our view is that breast cancer is a completely preventable disease.”
Dr Tuohy said that his vaccine made the patient’s immune system attack a specific protein found in most breast cancer cells and the mammary tissues of breastfeeding women. For this reason, it would not be given to women who planned to breastfeed.
