Tag: vaccine

Another Very Powerful WeaponAn experimental vaccine against malaria, an oftentimes-deadly disease that half the world is exposed to, is still in trials, but it could be in production by 2015.
Jeffrey Brown discusses the potential impact of the vaccine with Glaxo Smithkline CEO Andrew Witty.

CHICAGO (Reuters) - U.S. health officials said on Friday they are making progress in improving the supply of H1N1 vaccine to state health departments and urged people frustrated by long lines and scarce supply not to give up.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Dr. Anne Schuchat said there are now twice as many doses of vaccine available as there were two weeks ago, with 38 million doses ordered or available for ordering by states.

LANDOVER, Maryland (Reuters) - A U.S. government media event to promote H1N1 school vaccinations on Friday included VIPs, cute kids and a phalanx of television cameras -- but only one in five children at the school had proper parental consent to get immunized.

"This school was ready to go," Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius declared after touring a makeshift vaccination clinic in the cafeteria at Dodge Park Elementary School, near Washington.

A company is preparing human trials of a DNA-based, universal influenza vaccine.

The first doses of H1N1 flu (swine flu) vaccine are due to be shipped to hospitals around the country in the next few weeks--seven months after the virus strain was first identified. These vaccine doses will use either inactivated or weakened live viruses to prompt immunity--an approach that can fail if any of the live viruses is strong enough to replicate, or if the inactivated viruses have been killed beyond all immune recognition.

GENEVA (Reuters) - The World Health Organization said on Friday that tests had shown the current seasonal vaccine against flu would have little effect against the new H1N1 strain.

"There is very little chance that the seasonal vaccine ... will be effective against this particular virus," Marie-Paule Kieny, director of the WHO's initiative for vaccine research, told a news conference.