Researchers and Scientist from the University of Copenhagen with the help of the University of British Columbia found what appears to be a potential cure for cancer from the malaria vaccine for pregnant women. A malaria researcher, Ali Salanti and Cancer researcher, Mads Daugaard found this extraordinary breakthrough.
Salanti and Dauugard published a journal last Monday called Cancer Cell and said that they are planning for proceeding with human trials in the next four years. The research of the two scientists suggests that the carbohydrate that the malaria parasites attaches itself to in the placenta of pregnant women is the same with that of the cancer cells. Salanti said that their experiment showed that it is identical with the carbohydrate function of the cancer cells. And as they combined the malaria parasite and cancer cells, the parasite reacted to the cancer cells as if it attaches to a placenta.
The study shows that the carbohydrates make the placenta and cancer cells grow faster, hence using the vaccine is like killing the virus directly from the origin. The researchers that contributed to the study believed that with this discovery, they can finally find a cure or learn more about cancer.
Plasmodium Parasite is the cause of Malaria. It infects humans by mosquito bites and kills up to a million people each year, according to UNICEF and it is more dangerous for pregnant women. The parasite of Malaria attacks the placenta of the women. By this process, Scientist found out that it can be used to fight tumours or cancer cells since it has the same characteristics between tumours and placenta.
According to Salanti and Dauugard, the vaccine is yet ready or available for human use. Even though there are many reasons to believe that the vaccine is not viable for human consumption, many scientists and researchers believe that they are on the right track.
