- Flu-pocalypse? Why scientists are scrambling to make a ‘universal influenza vaccine’ (foxbusiness.com)
Flu season is already shaping up to be one of the worst seasons in over a decade, claiming the lives of nearly 20 children across the U.S. and 7% of senior deaths over the last month, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention...One of the reasons for the massive outbreak this year...is that it involves the dreaded H3N2, a strain of the influenza that isn’t “very well-matched” with the current vaccines that are being distributed across the U.S...In the making of the vaccine as it was being grown in eggs...it got mutilated a bit, so it drifted away from a really, really good match...even in a very good year the influenza vaccine is only about 60% effective. And, the projection of how effective it is going to be against the H3N2 this year is about 30%...Sanofi, who is one of the largest makers of flu vaccines...has been “continuously focused on improving influenza vaccines” over the years...This is evident in our introduction of Fluzone High-Dose Influenza vaccine, the first and only flu vaccine shown to have superior efficacy against influenza compared to Fluzone vaccine in adults 65 and older, and our recent acquisition of Protein Sciences, which has developed a recombinant DNA technology system for the production of recombinant proteins. The company additionally has ongoing efforts to develop a broadly protective influenza vaccine that would be effective despite natural mutation of flu strains over time...
- Zika update: Vaccine race swells, PaxVax CEO on how to stop ‘chasing epidemics’
As the Zika virus continues to spread, more biotechs are announcing their Zika vaccine programs. Meriden,.. Protein Sciences,..GeoVax Labs and.. PaxVax are the latest...Getting caught off-guard by epidemics like this has happened time and time again. And "chasing" outbreaks instead of anticipating them rarely results in a vaccine being developed in time. Witness the most recent Ebola epidemic: Merck's experimental vaccine, the furthest along in a crowded field, won't be submitted for regulatory approval until 2017, more than two years after the outbreak started...we had known about Ebola for decades...Companies got a head start in 2014 from partly developed candidates that had been shelved away. It is not so with Zika. "Almost everyone is pretty much starting from scratch...To avoid this and have programs in place before an outbreak hits...governments and nongovernmental organizations...should create economic incentives for companies to make vaccines for neglected diseases like Zika...the FDA's priority review voucher system, in which a company developing a vaccine for a neglected tropical disease receives a transferable voucher for expedited FDA review. Malaria and dengue have been on the list of neglected diseases for years, but Zika is not yet on the list