{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2025,10,12]],"date-time":"2025-10-12T03:10:26Z","timestamp":1760238626662,"version":"build-2065373602"},"reference-count":54,"publisher":"MDPI AG","issue":"3","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2022,7,1]],"date-time":"2022-07-01T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1656633600000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"funder":[{"name":"FEDER\u2014Fundo Europeu de Desenvolimento Regional","award":["IF\/00092\/2014\/CP1255\/CT0004"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["IF\/00092\/2014\/CP1255\/CT0004"]}]},{"name":"Portuguese funds","award":["IF\/00092\/2014\/CP1255\/CT0004"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["IF\/00092\/2014\/CP1255\/CT0004"]}]},{"name":"FCT and FEDER (European Union)","award":["IF\/00092\/2014\/CP1255\/CT0004"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["IF\/00092\/2014\/CP1255\/CT0004"]}]}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["IJTM"],"abstract":"<jats:p>In the past decade, mRNA vaccines have been highly discussed as a promising therapy for cancer. With the pandemic of COVID-19, some researchers redirected their studies to the development of a new vaccine for COVID-19 due to the urgent need. With the pandemic\u2019s deceleration due to the vaccines\u2019 success, the research and development of mRNA vaccines have turned to cancer again. Considering the new evidence and results generated by the vaccination of millions of people with mRNA vaccines, this article intends to provide a perspective on how the results from COVID-19 vaccination could now provide new insights for the development of an mRNA cancer vaccine. Many lessons were learned, and new evidence is available to re-focus and enhance the potential of the mRNA technology to cancer. Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna\u2019s mRNA technologies, and their significant advancements, allowed mRNA to overcome many of the challenges and blockers related to this platform in the past, now providing a new breadth of hope on using the mRNA technology to treat many diseases, namely cancer. This study also reports a better understanding of how it was possible to boost an accelerated development process of COVID-19 vaccines from a regulatory point of view. It is also relevant to consider other synergies and factors that contributed to gathering all the conditions ensuring the development of these vaccines in such a short period. Suppose the same efforts from all stakeholders could be applied to the development of new cancer vaccines, aligned now with the new scientific evidence generated from the current mRNA vaccines for COVID-19. In that case, mRNA cancer vaccines are near, and a new era for cancer treatment is about to begin.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3390\/ijtm2030025","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2022,7,3]],"date-time":"2022-07-03T22:50:46Z","timestamp":1656888646000},"page":"309-331","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/mdpi_crossmark_policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":0,"title":["The First Approved COVID-19 Vaccines: The Road to Cancer Vaccines"],"prefix":"10.3390","volume":"2","author":[{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0003-1055-3912","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Leonor","family":"Saldanha","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"OncoPharma Research Group, Center for Health Technology and Services Research (CINTESIS), Rua Dr. Pl\u00e1cido da Costa, 4200-450 Porto, Portugal"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-1283-1042","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Nuno","family":"Vale","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"OncoPharma Research Group, Center for Health Technology and Services Research (CINTESIS), Rua Dr. Pl\u00e1cido da Costa, 4200-450 Porto, Portugal"},{"name":"Department of Community Medicine, Health Information and Decision (MEDCIDS), Faculty of Medicine, University of Porto, Alameda Prof. Hern\u00e2ni Monteiro, 4200-319 Porto, Portugal"},{"name":"CINTESIS, Faculty of Medicine, University of Porto, Al. 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