By renewing telling with Cuba , America stands to pull in more than just a political or economic friend . Our feeler to cancer discourse could profit , too .
In Cuba , a nation known for its cigars , lung Cancer the Crab has been the fourthly - leading lawsuit of death . And despite stunted progress in other sector , Cuba ’s political science has long prioritized ergonomics and aesculapian research , particularly preventive medicament .
“ They ’ve had to do more with less,”saidCandace Johnson , chief operating officer of the Roswell Park Cancer Institute in Buffalo , N.Y. “ So they ’ve had to be even more modern with how they approach thing . For over 40 class , they have had a preeminent immunology community of interests . ”
Johnson is about to find out first manus just how successful Cuba ’s scientist have been . New York Governor Andrew Cuomo returned from Havana last month with a promise to bring a Cuban - developed lung Crab vaccinum stateside .
After strict examination for 25 years , in 2011 the vaccine CimaVax became available for free to the Cuban public . Now , Cuba ’s Center for Molecular Immunology is working with Roswell Park to transfer data about how it ’s develop , its perniciousness data , and results from preceding trials to get the discussion on track for approval by the Food and Drug Administration .
" We ’re still at the very former stages of evaluate the promise of this vaccine , but the grounds so far from clinical trials in Cuba and Europe has been expunge , " Dr. Kelvin Lee , Jacobs Family Chair in Immunology and conscientious objector - leader of the Tumor Immunology and Immunotherapy Program at Roswell Park , toldThe Huffington Post .
It ’s authoritative to remark that CimaVax does n’t cure cancer — in its current state it does n’t assault neoplasm directly , but rather prevents them from grow — but it prolongs and improves the lives of those who have it . Since its introduction , about5000 patientshave receive the vaccinum worldwide , include 1000 in Cuba . On median , patients who receive CimaVax lived 4 - 6 months longer . It ’s a serious beginning , and American scientists are take care forward to seeing where their research can take the vaccine .
" We think it may be an effective room to forbid genus Cancer from developing or revenant , so that ’s where a lot of our team ’s excitement comes in , " Lee said . " There ’s serious reason to conceive that this vaccinum may be effective in both treating and preventing several type of cancer , including not only lung but breast , colorectal , headspring - and - cervix , prostate and ovarian cancers , so the potential positively charged shock of this approach could be enormous . "
