الفهرس 
SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONOnly 14 pages are availabe for public view
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Abstract
In our opinion, tIle results of many years of allticancer vaccination [ can be SU111marized by starting that success has been too rare for one to be convinced, but too frequent for one to give up. It is very tempting to believe that a number of reported favorable clinical outcomes are indeed due to an itmnune allti-tumor response. This state of doubt is not extraordinary, considering the collection of lUlknowns involved in these iT’JnUlljzation attempts. Let us consider allogenic immunizations. It is not knoWll whether the cells used for vacination express tumor rejection antigens present on the tumor of the iIlllnunized pa~ient. Furthermore, it is ahl1ost impossible to find out whether vaccinated patients have made a response against the antigens present in the vaccine. Let us aSStlffie quite generously that in 50 percent of instances, the vaccine carries an antigen present on the tumor of the patient alld that the patient has a 50 percent chance of generating aT-cell response against the antigen. Let us aSSUlne, finally, that such a response has a 50 percent chance of being t11erapeutlcally sueful. This brings us to 12.5 percent of the vaccinated [ patients showing ~ clini~al effect, a level that is very difficult to distinguish ! from background m a dIsease such as melanoma. ,- The idettification of tumor rejection alltigens and their encoding genes should open new possibilities to decrease the number of unknoWlls in immunization studies.