A clinical trial is set to start this summer in Pittsburgh for a breast cancer vaccine.Pittsburgh’s Action News 4 talked with a breast cancer survivor about her own personal story and this latest development.“I was diagnosed in 2009. I was diagnosed Stage 4 right out of the gate…I recurred in 2012, and I have been in that treatment chair, I think I figured it out, it was 243 treatments, I've had every three weeks since June 2 of 2009,” Naomi Howard said.There is no end in sight for Howard, but what if all that could be avoided?“I can't even imagine if I didn't have to go through the last 14 years of my life and the upcoming years of my life,” Howard said.“All cancer is a pandemic. It’s a pandemic of our past, of our present and our future if we don't do something,” Dr. Olivera Finn said.Finn is a distinguished professor at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine and UPMC Hillman Cancer Center. Personal stories, like Howard’s, keep her determined. Finn has been working on cancer vaccines for decades.“In fact, in December of 1991, we actually opened the first in the world therapeutic vaccine trial, cancer vaccine trial here in Pittsburgh,” Finn said.Finn is now overseeing a breast cancer vaccine trial that could change people's lives. “Now, instead of trying to treat cancer with the vaccine, which is sort of a big ask of a vaccine, we are now trying to intercept cancer development or prevent cancer to begin with,” Finn said.The vaccine is designed for people who are diagnosed with pre-cancerous lesions, called DCIS, or those who are at high risk. “When women are diagnosed with these lesions, those are usually surgically removed. What we are trying to do is learn if getting the vaccine to women would perhaps eliminate the need for surgery,” Finn said.Finn said in this first trial, they will vaccinate women right after they are diagnosed and before they have surgery.“That's still standard of care; we will learn whether we have brought the immune system to the site of the lesion, which will tell us that, that lesion could disappear just through the action of the immune system,” Finn said.The trial will begin late this summer. To start, ten patients from UPMC Magee-Womens Hospital will participate.“This trial is planned for 50 women; 25 will get the vaccine and 25 will not. They will get a placebo,” Finn said.“Game changer. Absolute game changer,” Howard said. “So the future is really post-diagnosis, vaccination and no surgery,” Finn said.As for the present, Howard had this message for people fighting cancer.“Step away from the ledge. You are not going to die in the next two to three weeks, and you need to get your game on and your warrior on,” Howard said.Finn added a vaccine doesn't financially burden patients like treatments do, which gives her even more motivation for this trial.