Adding a personalized cancer vaccine to the blockbuster drug Keytruda kept more melanoma patients in remission than the immune therapy alone, co-developers Moderna Inc. and Merck & Co. said in their first detailed presentation of a key study.
About 79% of people who received both treatments stayed cancer-free 18 months later in a mid-stage trial, compared with 62% of people who received only Merck’s Keytruda, the companies said Sunday at the American Association for Cancer Research’s annual meeting in Orlando, Florida. Side effects with the vaccine were generally mild, such as fatigue, they said.
The cancer vaccine is an important part of Moderna’s post-pandemic strategy as the need for COVID-19 vaccines cools. The results suggest the combination works, and the companies will likely need to prove the effect in a much larger final-stage trial before seeking US approval, Merck Chief Medical Officer Eliav Barr said in an interview. While Moderna executives had earlier suggested the companies might pursue accelerated approval based on the mid-stage results, Barr said they are preparing to first complete the phase 3 study that should begin later this year.
