A swine flu (H1N1) pandemic swept the globe in 2009, reaching the U.K. in April 2009. The first infections in the U.K. were brought in by travelers from Mexico. By July 2, 2009, there had been 28,456 cases in the U.K. overall, and 6450 in Scotland. As a result of this, the Scottish authorities put a vaccination program in place for pandemic H1N1 2009 in October 2009, and a team of Scottish researchers have assessed its effectiveness in a paper published in The Lancet Infectious Diseases.The researchers looked at records from primary case and hospitals, as well as death certificates and virological swabs. They concluded that the vaccination program protected against pandemic influenza, as 77% of the people who had been vaccinated avoided infection with H1N1. The vaccine also cut the numbers of flu-related hospital admissions by 20%, as well as reducing the numbers of deaths."Our findings help strengthen the international evidence base for the effectiveness of H1N1 vaccination programs and the future distribution of pandemic influenza vaccines," said lead author Colin Simpson of the University of Edinburgh. "However, despite the best efforts to encourage the most vulnerable to be vaccinated, there were low rates of uptake in the very young and pregnant women who were most susceptible to the pandemic."If these techniques could be used to monitor vaccine uptake and effects in real time, this could help authorities and healthcare providers to distribute vaccines more effectively and efficiently.- read the press release
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Sunday, 1 July 2012
Scottish Researchers-Vaccination Program-Pandemic Influenza-H1n1 Flu Virus-Swine Flu
Tuesday, 10 April 2012
Immune Responses-Clinical Trial-Flu Shot-Vaccine
iBio's ($IBIO) shares have jumped 21% with the announcement that it has completed the first Phase I clinical trial of its plant-based vaccine for H1N1 influenza, HAC1. The study of the vaccine, produced by iBio's partner the Fraunhofer USA Center for Molecular Biotechnology, aimed to assess the vaccine's safety, as well as looking for early clues to its ability to trigger an immune response against the flu virus.The study showed that the vaccine was safe and well-tolerated at low and high doses, regardless of whether an adjuvant was used. The vaccine also triggered immune responses, with the best immune response seen in the people who received the highest dose of the vaccine without an adjuvant. This was a similar response to a marketed flu shot.The vaccine's development is supported by funding from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). The vaccine is based on iBio's iBioLaunch platform, which uses plants to produce engineered proteins. The researchers are analyzing the data and are preparing a manuscript for a peer-reviewed journal.- read the releaseRelated Articles:
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Monday, 5 March 2012
Herd Immunity-Flu Vaccines-Vaccinations
Many vaccines do more than just protect individual vaccinated people. They also protect the whole community through what is known as "herd immunity" by cutting the number of sick people carrying the infection. However, this situation doesn't apply with standard flu vaccines because the virus mutates quickly, so vaccinations need to be effectively created anew each year. Vaccination campaigns have to target vulnerable people, rather than trying to vaccinate the whole population.A number of groups are developing so-called "universal" flu vaccines, which rely on targeting conserved parts of the virus--parts that change very little. Researchers at Princeton University are looking at these universal vaccines, and believe that they can be used across the whole population. Because of this, they may actually slow down the mutation rate of the flu virus, and may also be able to create herd immunity, reducing the levels of infection across unvaccinated as well as vaccinated people.Herd immunity only works if vaccinations are widespread, though. To create this level of protection, vaccinations need to be at levels of 83% to 94%, depending on the infection. For many diseases, the levels have dropped below this, and outbreaks of preventable viral infections are out there, putting elderly people, pregnant women and other groups at risk. While there will always be some risks from vaccination, there are also some quite major risks from what may seem to be trivial diseases. Flu isn't trivial for vulnerable people. So, bring on the universal vaccines. -- Suzanne Elvidge (email) read more..