Professor Melief to receive 2022 Pedro J. Romero Service to JITC Award from Society for Immunotherapy of Cancer

• The Pedro J. Romero Award recognizes individuals who have made outstanding contributions to the cancer immunotherapy field
• Second SITC award this year to Professor Melief who will be honoured at the 37^th SITC Annual Meeting

Oegstgeest, The Netherlands, 08 September 2022 – ISA Pharmaceuticals B.V., a clinical stage biotech company developing immunotherapies to treat cancers and infectious diseases, is delighted to announce that Professor Dr. Cornelis “Kees” Melief, Chief Scientific Officer (CSO) and Founder of ISA Pharmaceuticals, has been awarded the 2022 Pedro J. Romero Service to JITC Award by the Society for Immunotherapy of Cancer (SITC). This Award recognizes individuals who made immeasurable contributions and demonstrated outstanding commitment to the Journal for Immunotherapy of Cancer (JITC) – the official journal of the SITC. The award will be presented at the SITC’s 37th Annual Meeting in Boston, 8-12 November 2022.

This award announcement follows the news that Professor Melief will be inducted as a Fellow of the Academy of Immuno-Oncology (FAIO), one of the SITC’s most prestigious honors.

Gerben Moolhuizen, Chief Executive Officer of ISA Pharmaceuticals, said: “We are very proud that Kees will be receiving two of SITC’s highest honors in recognition of his outstanding contributions to the field of cancer immunotherapy. His pioneering work holds the promise to significantly improve patient outcomes in the treatment of cancer, something we strive to carry forward to approved, clinically meaningful treatments. We truly value his dedication to patients and his scientific and medical guidance within our Company.”

Professor Melief is a globally recognized immunology expert, specializing in cancer immunology and immunotherapy. He is known for his groundbreaking translational work in devising new cancer therapies that activate the patient’s own immune system. In addition to his role as CSO at ISA Pharmaceuticals, he is Emeritus Professor of Immunology at the Leiden University Medical Center in the Netherlands. He is author of more than 545 peer-reviewed publications, cited over 67.000 times, and inventor on more than 30 patents and patent applications.

For ISA Pharmaceuticals, Professor Melief has been instrumental in the advancement of the versatile synthetic long peptide (SLP®) immunotherapy platform, yielding several clinical stage immunotherapeutics for the treatment of different cancer types and infectious diseases. The Company’s lead product ISA101b was recently awarded Fast Track designation by the US FDA for treatment of recurrent and metastatic, human papilloma virus type 16 (HPV16)-positive oropharyngeal cancer (OPC) and also has US Orphan Drug Designation in HPV16-positive cervical cancer. ISA also has an emerging pipeline of SLP-based immunotherapies for highly prevalent diseases including PRAME-driven cancers and chronic hepatitis B.