GM tobacco used to develop vaccine against cancer

Genetically modified tobacco is being developed to fight cancer. In a remarkable turnaround, scientists believe they can use the plant - which kills some four million people world-wide each year - to produce a vaccine against cervical cancer.

Genetically modified tobacco is being developed to fight cancer. In a remarkable turnaround, scientists believe they can use the plant - which kills some four million people world-wide each year - to produce a vaccine against cervical cancer.

Their work, which is backed by the US government, was hailed as "a very positive development" by anti-smoking campaigners yesterday.

Scientists from Georgetown University Medical Centre in Washington DC and North Carolina State University are growing the potentially life-saving tobacco and say they will know whether they have made an extraordinary medical breakthrough within two years. The US Congress recently voted $3m to finance their research.

Dr Ken Dretchen, Dean of Research at the medical centre, said last week that the research was designed to develop a vaccine against the human papiloma virus, which causes cervical cancer, the second most common cancer in women in Europe. This claims 1,200 lives in Britain alone each year.

So far, scientists have failed to produce a vaccine the normal way, by cultivating a dead version of the virus. The new research succeeded in inserting genes from the virus into tobacco seeds, which have been sown in a North Carolina field.

The plants are growing, and the idea is that the virus will multiply. After harvesting, the raw material for a vaccine - minus nicotine and other harmful substances - will be extracted. Dr Dretchen says his team will know whether they have succeeded "at the end of two or three growing cycles". The plant is suitable, he says, as it is easier to grow and harvest, and simple to insert genes into.

Congressional backing for the research has been led by right-wing senator Jesse Helms and Congressman Robin Hayes - both Republicans representing North Carolina.Cynics speculate that it may be designed to encourage the State's hard-pressed tobacco farmers in an election year.

But Clive Bates, Director of Action on Smoking and Health, said yesterday: "This kind of thing is the way ahead for tobacco and the people who farm it. We have not got anything against the plant itself, just the way it is used. If they can find something better to do with it than turning it into coffin nails that has to be a good thing."