Acambis is readying a new one-shot flu vaccine |
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Sat, 06 Aug 2005 14:05
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LONDON: Britain's bio-technology firm Acambis Plc is developing a one-shot vaccine that can provide permanent protection against all types of flu, including bird flu. The product, which is expected to enter human trials in about a couple of months, is claimed to be a universal vaccine that can offer protection against both A and B strains of influenza and need not be taken every year as in the case of existing flu vaccines.
The Cambridge-based company is collaborating with Belgium's Flanters Interuniversity Institute for Biotechnology for the project.
At present people prone to the infection are required to take the shots annually and there is no vaccine that can prevent the bird flu. As many as 4,000 people are killed by the flu infection in the U.K every year, while globally some one million people die of the infection.
| There are apprehensions that the bird flu virus which is prevalent in Asia among its poultry could mutate and spread to humans and leading to human-to-human infections, in which case, there could be a pandemic. Flu vaccines available now provide immunity to two proteins called haemaglutinin and neuraminidase, which are found on the surface of flu viruses and which have the power to mutate. Scientists working on the new vaccine said they are focusing on a different protein, called M2, which does not mutate.
Chief scientific officer at Acambis Dr Thomas Monath said the new vaccine can avoid the need for annual re-engineering and manufacture of a new product. ""The need to develop a new vaccine each time a different influenza strain emerges often results in long delays before a population can be protected. The technology also has special importance as a potential means of protecting human populations against pandemic influenza strains."
Acambis is a vaccine maker and is known for its smallpox vaccine ACAM2000, which the U.S. is storing as part of its efforts to combat a bio-war.
While health experts have welcomed the development, there are those who are reserved in their opinion. They feel such a vaccine could create a deadly strain of vaccine-resistant "super-flu" virus. It could also be 10 years before the vaccine is available commercially.
Professor Andrew Read, of the Institute of Immunology and Infection Research at Edinburgh University, said, while it is possible theoretically that a non-strain-specific virus could make things worse. He said one theory is that particularly virulent strains of diseases die out because they kill off their host. If a general vaccine is developed, it could lead to such deadly diseases being kept alive which could be devastating for those who had not been vaccinated.
Health chiefs warned it could be ten years before the vaccine was available to the public.
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