News Health & Medicine

A new cancer vaccine may keep melanoma from coming back

The personalized mRNA shot teaches the body to attack a patient’s specific melanoma cells

a person's knee is shown close up. a medical professional is pointing to a freckle on the knee while examining it with a medical flashlight held in their other hand.

A cancer vaccine candidate shows promise in clinical trials, according to pharmaceutical companies Moderna and Merck. The shot aims to teach a patient’s body to attack melanoma cancer cells in combination with the immunotherapy drug.

FRED TANNEAU/AFP/Getty Images

By Erin Garcia de Jesús

A new vaccine could soon protect patients from returning skin cancer.