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Article: The new promise of cancer vaccines: triggering the immune system to battle tumors.
- Article from:
- U.S. News & World Report
- Article date:
- March 6, 1995
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1995 All rights reserved. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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If the immune system is the body's defending army against foreign invaders, then cancer cells are Stealth bombers. For reasons not yet fully understood, tumors manage to elude the immune system's radar. Patients must turn to chemotherapy, radiation and surgery to eradicate their cancer. But medicine's arsenal is a clumsy substitute for the usually hawk-eyed immune system. Conventional treatments often kill normal tissue as well as tumors, while stray cancer cells sometimes escape destruction.
Frustrated by standard therapies' inability to cure patients consistently, a growing number of cancer researchers are hoping to create vaccines that enlist the aid of the body's ...