Breakthrough vaccine excites cancer researcher

Published 9:00 pm Thursday, October 6, 2005

Rarely has a cancer treatment of any kind shown effectiveness so early as the new experimental vaccine for cervical cancer, an epidemiologist at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center said Thursday.

Stephen Schwartz said having a vaccine to prevent cancer “is not unique, but hasn’t been done very often.”

“Some may say this is too good to be true,” he said. “We’ve rarely had a vaccine for cancer of any kind that’s shown it’s as effective so early.”

One other vaccine now exists that prevents liver cancer by preventing hepatitis B infection.

Even so, Schwartz said, evidence that the hepatitis B vaccine prevents liver cancer is not nearly as strong as the evidence showing that cervical cancer can be prevented by the new vaccine, named Gardasil.

The study of the vaccine’s effectiveness was led by Laura Koutsky, a professor of epidemiology at the University of Washington.

Many advances in cancer research, initially publicized for their ability to cure or prevent cancer, haven’t panned out, Schwartz said.

Yet, with prevention rates reported to be 97 percent for women who received just one dose of Gardasil, “it’s still a huge, huge preventative effect,” Schwartz said, even if over time the vaccine turns out to be less effective.

“It’s likely that we will not be disappointed,” Schwartz added.

Virginia Ng, a spokeswoman for the American Cancer Society, said an estimated 110 new cases of cervical cancer are diagnosed in Washington state every year.

In Snohomish County, an average of six women died each year of the disease between 2000 and 2002, Ng said.

The county’s overall death rate from the disease – 2.1 per 100,000 women – is higher than the state average of 1.7 per 100,000, she said.

Reporter Sharon Salyer: 425-339-3486 or salyer@heraldnet.com.