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Progress Reported on Universal Flu Vaccines

posted by CoolHand on Tuesday August 25 2015, @10:05AM   
from the super-flu-ent-in-vaccines dept.

takyon writes:

Two separate U.S. teams have reportedly made progress on creating a universal influenza vaccine, according to the BBC:

Researchers say they are closer to developing a vaccine to give life-long protection against any type of flu, after promising trials in animals. Two separate US teams have found success with an approach that homes in on a stable part of the flu virus. That should remove the problem with current flu vaccines which must be given anew each year because they focus on the mutating part of the virus.

The proof-of-concept work is published in Science journal and Nature Medicine [both paywalled]. Studies are now needed in humans to confirm that the method will work in man.

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Original Submission

• Re:Might wipe it out Re:Might wipe it out (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 25 2015, @02:42PM

  by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 25 2015, @02:42PM (#227610)

  No, it says that the exact worldwide numbers are not known. Many parts of the world do not do a PCR or antibody test to confirm what someone died of and just classify the cause based on symptoms. Guess why it is called Influenza-like illness and not coronavirus-like illness.

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• Re:Might wipe it out Re:Might wipe it out (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 25 2015, @11:06PM

  by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 25 2015, @11:06PM (#227843)

  Yea, just like once they started confirming measles like illness they find this happens for less than 2% of suspected cases:

  Indeed, an average of only 100 cases of measles are confirmed annually [32], despite the fact that >20,000 tests are conducted [28], directly suggesting the low predictive value of clinical suspicion alone. "

  http://jid.oxfordjournals.org/content/189/Supplement_1/S185.full [oxfordjournals.org]

  Measles has become rare since the national MR campaign2. Notified cases have been tested for measles IgM in saliva. In 1996, 3274 of the 5878 notified cases were tested, and measles was confirmed in 63 (1.9%) of those tested. This low proportion reflects dramatic changes in the epidemiology of measles. Many of the notified cases of measles in 1996 may have been diseases other than measles, and it is likely that a proportion of notified cases have always been misdiagnosed3. Some notified cases may have been due to rubella, which has fallen because of immunisation, parvovirus B19 or herpes hominis virus 6, the cause of roseola infantum3,4 and some may have non-infectious diseases. If it is assumed that the number of incorrectly diagnosed notified cases of measles is about 5 000 each year, then 195 000 of the 200 000 cases each year before the introduction of vaccine were due to measles, and the diagnosis would have been correct in over 95% of cases. When about 10 000 cases were notified each year, the diagnosis would have been correct in about half of cases1. When measles is eliminated, the diagnosis will be incorrect in all notified cases.

  Editor CDR. Communicable Disease Report. Volume 7, Number 6, 7 February 1997. Public Health Laboratory Service. ISSN 1350-9357
  http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20140714084352/http://www.hpa.org.uk/cdr/archives/1997/cdr0697.pdf [nationalarchives.gov.uk]

  Note the assumption of constant number of incorrectly diagnosed cases is an assumption. This number may have been much higher in the past. The fact is that many viruses cause similar symptoms, no matter what you look at. Estimating such numbers is not straight forward.

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  • Re:Might wipe it out Re:Might wipe it out (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 26 2015, @01:54AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 26 2015, @01:54AM (#227911)

    Are you seriously trying to compare estimating the number of measles cases with those of influenza? Comparing the surveillance of a disease that has been substantially reduced and typically only results in a single presentation with one that infects a large proportion of people every year does not make sense.

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    • Re:Might wipe it out (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 26 2015, @02:15AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 26 2015, @02:15AM (#227919)

      Based on previous experience, if we have no idea what percent of these cases will be confirmed we should assume it is low. It is not my fault they decided to implement widespread measles vaccination before collecting good data on how many people actually had measles. It also won't be my fault when they do the same thing for influenza, once again leaving us with ambiguous information that can be explained multiple ways.

      My point is that nearly everything I read about medicine is based on sloppy as hell research. I think the basic idea behind vaccinations makes a lot of sense, and should be investigated properly by scientists.

      Parent