She’d had a massive tumor removed from her liver the year prior, but was now learning the cancer had spread to her bones and into her blood.
asserted
cancer → have → blood
Hones had a rare cancer called fibrolamellar carcinoma that was now stage 4.
asserted
that → have → cancer
After being advised that most chemotherapies wouldn’t work for her, she decided she’d rather have six to 24 months without treatment, “sailing off into the sunset, enjoying my life,” she told The Post.
asserted
she → advise → Post
With a career helping children and families, Hones has long had a “deep commitment” to serving others.
asserted
Hones → help → others
So knowing it might help researchers better understand the disease, she told her doctor: “I want to donate my body to science.”
uncertain
I → know → science
If she was ready to do that, doctors asked: Why not join a trial for an experimental drug?
asserted
doctors → do → drug
She agreed.
asserted
She → agree → ?
It’s something she now looks back on as a “moonshot.”
asserted
she → ’ → moonshot
By September of that year, five months later, she was in full remission from her cancer, and remains in remission today.
asserted
she → remain → remission
It wasn’t a miracle that helped banish the cancer — it was a cancer vaccine.
asserted
it → help → cancer
Unlike chemotherapy and radiation, which attack cancer directly but can damage healthy cells along the way, cancer vaccines teach the immune system to recognize and destroy cancer cells itself.
asserted
system → attack → cells
This allows the body to fight cancer on its own, even years after treatment.
asserted
body → allow → treatment
“I think that this is a moment where we really could make cancer curable by using cancer vaccines in addition to other therapies,” Kristen Dahlgren, a breast cancer survivor and external affairs officer at the Parker Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy (PICI), told The Post.
uncertain
Dahlgren → think → Post
“I think we’re about to change things profoundly for cancer patients.”
asserted
we → think → patients
For the estimated 18 million Americans who are living with or have survived cancer, the kind of lasting remission Hones experienced no longer seems so far-fetched.
asserted
Hones → estimate → remission
In August, Moderna announced that their personalized cancer vaccine for melanoma succeeded in Phase 3 trials, the final phase before moving to the FDA for approval and landing on the market.
asserted
vaccine → announce → market
The first of its kind, it could become available as early as next year — and is also being tested in cancers of the lung, bladder kidney, pancreas and stomach.
uncertain
it → become → lung
While it all may seem quite sudden, the cancer vaccine landscape builds on over a century of research and development, with a flurry of advancement over the last two decades.
uncertain
landscape → seem → decades
When most people think of vaccines, the prevention of viruses come to mind: measles, polio, the flu.
asserted
prevention → think → mind
But most research concerning cancer is focused on therapeutic vaccines, which treat existing cancer.
asserted
which → concern → cancer
Both preventative and therapeutic vaccines, though, try to stimulate the immune system, creating a lasting memory so the body can continue to fight off a threat, explained Dr. Cathy Wu, a cancer vaccine researcher at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute.
asserted
Wu → try → Institute
“We’re using the vaccines to prevent relapse in those patients at high risk of relapse,” she said.
asserted
she → use → relapse
“We’re … trying to prevent the cancer from coming back.”
asserted
We → try → cancer
Cancer vaccines can also be either “off-the-shelf” or personalized.
asserted
vaccines → personalize → shelf
Off-the-shelf vaccines target features shared across many patients, rather than being tailored to one person.
asserted
vaccines → target → person
That’s how we’re accustomed to vaccines working — the ones we get for the flu, for instance, are essentially the same for everyone.
asserted
we → ’ → everyone
Her cancer, fibrolamellar carcinoma, almost always produces a specific abnormality across patients.
asserted
cancer → produce → patients
This allowed scientists to develop a vaccine that would work across many patients with the same cancer.
asserted
that → allow → cancer
They arise as cells accumulate mutations that allow them to grow out of control.
asserted
them → arise → control
Those mutations vary from one person to the next — and keep piling up as cancer evolves.
asserted
cancer → vary → next
The result: No two tumors are exactly alike, and even different cells within the same tumor can carry different mutations.
asserted
cells → carry → mutations
That’s where personalized cancer vaccines come in.
asserted
vaccines → ’ → ?
Doctors sequence the DNA of a patient’s cancer and develop a custom vaccine to teach the body to target and destroy it.
asserted
Doctors → sequence → it
Each vaccine costs over $100,000 to manufacture.
asserted
vaccine → cost → 100,000
Researchers are now working to streamline that process, with the goal of making personalized vaccines faster and more affordable to produce.
asserted
vaccines → work → goal
On the hunt for treatment
Cancer vaccines remain limited to clinical trials for now, leaving many patients fighting to get treatment.
Two years on from her breast cancer diagnosis, Ari Nakata had gone through chemo and radiation — and her tumor marker tests didn’t show evidence the cancer had returned.
But her back suddenly “gave out,” she told The Post, and she was concerned.
asserted
she → limit → Post
“Cancer is such a complicated, individualized, personalized disease,” the mother of two said.
asserted
mother → say → two
“What they don’t tell you is that not everything applies to everyone.
asserted
everything → tell → everyone
So in my case, those tumor marker blood tests said that everything was fine — but it wasn’t.”
asserted
it → say → case
She got an MRI, which revealed that the cancer had spread to her back, bones, lungs and liver.
asserted
cancer → get → back
…and 29 more, not listed.
The Aporia
