On Oct. 4, 2024, researchers from Oxford university announced they had been awarded funding from Cancer Research UK to create the world’s first vaccine to prevent ovarian cancer, a vaccine which teaches the immune system to recognise and attack the earliest stages of ovarian cancer. The team will receive up to £600,000 for the study over the next three years to support lab research into the vaccine.

In this study, the Cancer Research UK-funded scientists intend to find out which proteins on the surface of early-stage ovarian cancer cells are most strongly recognised by the immune system and how effectively the vaccine kills mini-models of ovarian cancer called organoids. If this research is successful, work will begin on clinical trials of the vaccine upon its completion in 2027. The Ovarian Cancer Cell Laboratory at the University of Oxford will lead for the OvarianVax project.

There are around 7,500 new ovarian cancer cases every year in the UK, and it is the 6^th most common cancer in women. There is no current screening programme for the disease and some women with inherited copies of altered genes are at higher risk. Ovarian cancer risk is up to 65% higher in women with altered BRCA1 genes, and up to 35% higher in women with altered BRCA2 genes, compared to women without these gene alterations. Currently, women with BRCA1/2 alterations are recommended to have their ovaries removed by the age of 35, which means that they can’t have children in the future, and they experience early menopause.