BBC's Clare Runacres says melanoma jab breakthrough left her in tears

• BBC Radio host Clare Runacres said the news today that a personalised mRNA jab could soon reduce the chance of skin cancer returning gave her ‘such hope’
• READ MORE: The mother-of-four who miraculously beat cancer FIFTEEN times  

BBC Radio news presenter Clare Runacres says hearing the news today about a potential ‘game-changer’ jab for skin cancer patients left her ‘in tears’ – after she’s endured her own long battle with the disease.

University College London Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust (UCLH) revealed on Friday that it’s now leading the final phase of trials of a personalised mRNA jab, which early results have shown could drastically improve melanoma survival chances and stop cancer returning.

Broadcaster Runacres, 52, who works across Radio 2, 6Music and 5Live, was first diagnosed with stage two melanoma as a student at university.

Following initial successful treatment, she embarked on her journalism career but the disease returned nine years, and she was told the aggressive cancer had spread.

Engaged to her now husband Mike Ramsden at the time, Clare wrote last year that she was ‘planning my funeral when I was planning my wedding’ after being told the prognosis was poor.

BBC Radio news host Clare Runacres, who was diagnosed with skin cancer while at university and, nearly ten years later, given the devastating news that her cancer had returned said she read the positive news this morning about a potential ‘game-changing’ jab for melanoma patients with ‘tears in my eyes’

Runacres posted this morning on X, formerly Twitter, about her own battle with melanoma

Today’s news that patients diagnosed with melanoma might face a more positive outlook sparked tears, Runacres told her X followers. She said: ‘Living in the shadow of cancer is hard. But days like today give me such hope.

‘I read this article with tears in my eyes. I have spent so long trying to ward off the spread of my cancer, leading a quiet and careful life, balancing diet, exercise, sleep and stress, striving to live positively.’

Runacres added: ‘I approach each day with gratitude and a glad heart knowing I’m one of the lucky ones, having survived so long. Seeing more and more promising options being developed for melanoma is amazing.’

She also praised the medical research team and doctors, saying they were ‘my absolute heroes’.

Radio presenter Clare Runacres pictured with her husband Mike. Speaking about her wedding day in 2003, she said previously: ‘In our first years of marriage, we lived in the moment. We didn’t know what the future held’

52-year-old Clare, from London, is best known for her soothing voice as she reads the news on BBC Radio 2, 6 Music and 5 Live

BBC Radio newsreader Clare Runacres thought she and then-boyfriend, Mike Ramsden, would not make it to their first wedding anniversary following her cancer diagnosis 20 years ago

This is my best hope of stopping the disease in its tracks

One of the first patients on the trial at UCLH is Steve Young, 52, from Stevenage.

His ‘bump on the head’ — which he thinks he had for around a decade — turned out to be melanoma.

He said it was a ‘massive shock’ to be diagnosed.

‘I literally spent two weeks just thinking ‘this is it’,’ he said.

‘My dad died of emphysema when he was 57 and I actually thought ‘I’m going to die younger than my dad’.’

Mr Young said when he was told about the trial at UCLH it ‘really triggered my geek radar’.

He added: ‘It really piqued my interest.

‘As soon as they mentioned this mRNA technology that was being used to potentially fight cancer, I was just like, ‘it sounds fascinating’ and I still feel the same. I’m really, really excited.

‘This is my best chance at stopping the cancer in its tracks.’

In an article for MailOnline last year, Runacres revealed how celebrating her 20th wedding anniversary was a ‘miracle’.

She said been in her second year reading theology at the University of Oxford when she was first diagnosed.

After visiting her GP with a bad back, her doctor had spotted an unusual mole.

A biopsy returned the devastating news that she had melanoma.

She said: ‘I was totally thrown. I was young and could count on the fingers of one hand the number of times I’d been sunburnt. How could I have a skin cancer capable of killing me?’

Surgery, leaving a 20 cm scar on her back, left her cancer-free for nine years, before she was told it had returned after she discovered a lump under her left armpit.

She was told by doctors that the majority of patients with her diagnosis would die within six months.

Revealing how she told her loved ones, she said: ‘We are not a gushy family; the silence on the other end of the phone from my father, a GP, told me all I needed to know. The news was very bad.

‘I was operated on quickly; a much smaller, tidier scar this time for a much bigger problem. I was referred to the Royal Free Hospital in Hampstead. My doctor said I had stage 3b melanoma that had spread to my lymph nodes.’

After Mike proposed to Clare in April 2003, the couple decided to set a wedding date for September that year.

Before their wedding day, Clare underwent a second operation to remove the new cancerous mass.

Although the surgery was successful, Clare anticipated that it would spread again, as it had the first time.

Sharing pictures of her wedding day last year, she said: ‘It was a beautiful day. Full of love and tears. Surrounded by our closest friends and family, we put our fears aside and danced til dawn.

‘Even now I can’t look at the photos without feeling that raw emotion. To reach 20 years feels like a miracle.’

However, the couple went on to have a family, with the BBC star giving birth to three babies within four years – who all have the same birthday.

She added, ‘Basically, I was planning my funeral when I was planning my wedding. From then on, I measured out my wellness on milestones that my children made. The milestones I’ve seen have been magical.’

More on the personalised mRNA jab

What are mRNA vaccines?

While the science dates back to 2005, the first vaccines to use the mRNA technology were those made by BioNTech and Moderna against the Covid virus.

Messenger RNA, or mRNA, is a genetic blueprint that instructs cells to manufacture proteins in the body.

Unlike other traditional vaccines, a live or attenuated virus is not injected or required at any point.

For Covid, the mRNA vaccine instructed cells to make the spike protein found on the surface of the virus itself.

These harmless proteins ‘train’ the immune system to recognise the virus and then to make cells that fight it if someone later gets infected with the real thing.

How does the melanoma treatment work?

Known as mRNA-4157 (V940), the jab triggers the immune system to fight back against the patient’s specific type of cancer and tumour.

To create the treatment, a sample of tumour is removed during the patient’s surgery.

DNA sequencing is then carried out to identify proteins produced by cancer cells, known as neoantigens, that will trigger an immune response.

These are then used to create a personalised mRNA vaccine that tells the patient’s body to generate the tumour-specific neoantigen proteins.

Once injected, the immune system reacts to the proteins by creating fighter T cells which attack the tumour, killing the cancer cells.

The immune system should recognise any future rogue cells, hopefully stopping the cancer returning.

What have the trials shown?

Scientists have given trial participants the jab alongside an immunotherapy drug, pembrolizumab or Keytruda, that also helps the immune system kill cancer cells.

Data from the phase 2 trial published in December found people with serious high-risk melanomas who received the jab alongside Keytruda were almost half (49 per cent) as likely to die or have their cancer come back after three years than those who were given only Keytruda.

Patients received one milligram of the mRNA vaccine every three weeks for a maximum of nine doses, and 200 milligrams of Keytruda every three weeks (maximum 18 doses) for about a year.

Dr Heather Shaw, national co-ordinating investigator for the UCLH trial, said there was real hope the therapy could be a ‘game-changer’, particularly as it appeared to have ‘relatively tolerable side effects’.

These include tiredness and a sore arm when the jab was given, she said, adding that for the majority of patients it appeared no worse than having a flu or Covid vaccine.

When will the jab be available?

The combined treatment is not yet available routinely on the NHS, outside of clinical trials.

But Stéphane Bancel, Moderna’s director general, believes that an mRNA vaccine for melanoma could be available in 2025.

The phase-three global trial will include a wider range of patients and researchers are hoping to recruit around 1,100 people.

At least 60 to 70 patients across eight UK centres — including in London, Manchester, Edinburgh and Leeds — are set to be recruited.

The twin therapy combination will also be tested in lung, bladder and kidney cancer.

The patients on trial must have had their high-risk melanoma surgically removed in the last 12 weeks to ensure the best result.

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