Researchers testing needle-free flu vaccine
Instead of visiting the doctor each fall, sitting in a waiting room
filled with the sniffling, sneezing masses -- what if you could just
slap on a flu vaccine "patch" sent in the mail?
That's the vision of researchers who've developed and conducted early
tests on an injection-free vaccine that looks like a Band-Aid you place
on your arm.
Their initial hope is to create such a vaccine that would allow for a rapid public health response in case of a pandemic flu.
"If there's a pandemic flu, the last thing you want is for people to be
coughing on each other while they're waiting for a flu shot," said the
study's lead author, Darrick Carter.
"The new vaccine uses a combination of three technologies, and was
designed quite specifically to be used by the person receiving the
vaccine. It could be sent through the mail, and you could put it on and
protect yourself," said Carter. He's vice president of the Infectious
Diseases Research Institute in Seattle.
Microneedles on the patch deliver the vaccine. "Mostly, when we get
injured, we scrape ourselves or get a superficial wound, and much of the
immune system lays on the surface of the skin to respond," Carter said,
explaining why it isn't necessary to have an intramuscular injection.
Another component of the vaccine is a new type of antigen -- the
substance that causes the immune system to produce protective
antibodies. Carter said another company provided this component. It uses
reprogrammed plant cells to produce virus-like particles.
The final component is an adjuvant -- a substance to boost the effectiveness of the vaccine.
The researchers tested a liquid form of the vaccine and the adjuvant on
ferrets. A single vaccine fully protected the animals, they said.
They also gave the liquid form of the adjuvant and vaccine to 100 humans
to test the vaccine's safety. There were no significant side effects.
In addition, those given the vaccine showed a stronger immune response.
However, this study wasn't designed to test how effective the vaccine
was in humans.
"This is a clinical proof of concept study," Carter said. The
researchers hope to get additional funding to move forward with the next
phase of human trials. If all goes well, Carter said it might be
possible to have this vaccine approved in five years or so.
Dr. David Davenport, director of infection prevention at Borgess Medical
Center in Kalamazoo, Mich., said this could be a "game-changer." He was
not involved with the study.
"Egg-based vaccines are incredibly antiquated and we have to move away
from that," Davenport said. "The egg-based vaccine takes way too long
[to manufacture], sometimes six months or longer. If we had a major
epidemic, we need the ability to rapidly scale up, and a plant-based
vaccine could take three months or less."
Plus, Davenport said, sending a vaccine through the mail for people to
self-administer "could get high numbers of people vaccinated."
Currently, fewer than half of Americans get an annual flu shot, the U.S.
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates.
Results of the ferret and early human trials were published Sept. 12 in the journal Science Advances.
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