Jaime Leandro Foundation

The Jaime Leandro Foundation for Therapeutic Cancer Vaccines is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit that arranges personalised neoantigen peptide vaccines for individual patients, through clinical trials or, when no suitable trial exists, under the FDA's expanded access (compassionate use) rule. It describes itself as the hub: partners sequence the tumour, choose the patient-specific neoantigen targets and make, vial and ship the vaccine, which the patient's own physician gives; the foundation consults and contracts with the patient about costs, holds the investigational new drug application and trial liability insurance, and helps prepare the FDA expanded access request. Its site says a personalised vaccine takes four to five months to develop. Its named collaborators are CSBio, the peptide manufacturer that makes the vaccines, and Wide Trial, its regulatory partner for expanded access programmes.

The foundation is named for Jaime Leandro, who was diagnosed with stage 4 pancreatic cancer in July 2019 and died on 8 March 2020 aged 41; it grew from the plans of Steve Aldrich, who had stage 4 oesophageal adenocarcinoma and used a personalised neoantigen vaccine among his treatments, and who died on 7 July 2020. Its board includes Marty Tenenbaum of Cancer Commons and xCures, and William Gillanders and Malachi Griffith of Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. The IRS Exempt Organizations Business Master File gives its filing address as Chapel Hill, North Carolina (EIN 85-3117614) and records revenue of about $4.8 million on its filing for the tax year ending December 2025. Future of Cancer Care Today lists it as patient-orderable.