In an exclusive interview with Cure, Kristen Dahlgren, Founder and CEO of the Cancer Vaccine Coalition, discusses the groundbreaking efforts to speed the development of cancer vaccines, starting with breast cancer.
As a breast cancer survivor and former NBC Network medical correspondent, Dahlgren is passionate about bridging the gap between cutting-edge research and clinical application. She shared the coalition's mission to fund, support and enroll patients in clinical trials to bring a cancer vaccine to market within the next decade.
Cure: What is the Cancer Vaccine Coalition?
Kristen Dahlgren: The Cancer Vaccine Coalition is an effort to accelerate cancer vaccines, beginning with breast cancer. The coalition consists of top cancer researchers from Memorial Sloan Kettering, Dana-Farber, Cleveland Clinic, MD Anderson, UW's Cancer Vaccine Institute, UPenn and Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center working on these incredible advances in science, along with anyone that can help streamline and support the research.
Cure: Why did you create the Cancer Vaccine Coalition? What is its mission?
Dahlgren: I was a longtime NBC correspondent when I learned that breast cancer vaccines were not just in development but also in clinical trials. I was blown away. I did medical reporting, and, more importantly, I was a survivor of breast cancer and I had never heard of vaccines.
Researchers told me they were unlocking the science, but the process would be long and slow to get vaccines to market. As someone who thinks about recurrence every day and sees many who are not as lucky as me, I couldn't let this brilliant research languish if there were ways to support it and move it faster.
We could save hundreds of thousands of lives, so our mission is to help fund and enroll trials to get a breast cancer vaccine to market in five to 10 years or less.
Cure: Vaccine technology can be used in two ways: to help prevent a disease or to treat a disease. On which type of use does the Cancer Vaccine Coalition focus?
Dahlgren: Both! Initially, it is most likely that treatment vaccines will be first to move through trials and gain approval, as data endpoints are most attainable in this population. That is, these vaccines are designed to stop progression or eliminate someone's disease. But promising vaccine research underway also aims to prevent cancer recurrence and even to prevent disease in the first place in high risk populations like BRCA+ individuals. In both cases, the vaccines work similarly, training the immune system to recognize and eradicate cancer whenever it appears.
Cure: The Cancer Vaccine Coalition describes itself as "moving science forward...faster." Can you share any recent milestones from one of your activities?
Dahlgren: We believe the biggest advances can come through collaboration, and we are already seeing that in our short (less than a year) existence.
I brought together researchers at the University of Washington and Roswell Park, who are now working on starting a trial together in metastatic triple-negative breast cancer. By having two sites for the trial, patient enrollment will be quicker, and we'll see more ethnic and geographic diversity to provide more inclusive results. We are also funding trials to get them started sooner.
Cure: How does the Cancer Vaccine Coalition build community? How do you work with partner organizations?
Dahlgren: This is a coalition of EVERYONE interested in a cancer-free future. We all know someone who the disease has impacted, and we all have a vested interest in ensuring the most promising science moves forward quickly.
We've been working with organizers in the UK who are already giving 10,000 cancer vaccines as part of huge national clinical trials. We can do something similar here in the US, so we have been working to include pharmaceutical companies, government agencies and organizations that have access to patients to fill the trials.
I also see this as a movement where we all can stand up and demand better. Government and pharmaceutical companies have long been the gatekeepers in what research gets funded. But we're seeing a paradigm shift where patient advocates and those impacted by diseases can help support vital science and move things through the pipeline quicker.
Cure: What has the Cancer Vaccine Coalition program planned as new initiatives for 2025?
Dahlgren: We will continue to work with our scientists to fund and fill promising trials. We plan to host a cancer vaccine summit, bringing together all of the top minds in cancer vaccine research. Together, they can ensure they are building on each other's research and explore opportunities for collaboration in trials. We are adding corporate sponsors and hope to raise the millions needed to advance more clinical trials.
Cure: How can someone join the Cancer Vaccine Coalition program or get more information?
Dahlgren: Please check out our website, Cancer Vaccine Coalition. Sign up for our newsletters, follow us on social media,and please reach out with questions. This effort is going to take all of us. Awareness and funding are the biggest needs right now. Researchers are already unlocking the science. The rest of us can help unlock the funding and support. Thank you.