Crucell« Terug naar discussie overzicht

1. [verwijderd] 24 januari 2006 20:53

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   quote:

   babs11 schreef:

   Zullen we een fanclub op gaan zetten Flosz?? Go Ronald go...
   
   Babs
   

   Rijen dik, kilometers lang, mensenmassa op weg naar Bush...demanding een Crucell-Inside vaccin......... hup naar de TBC nu.
   gr.
2. [verwijderd] 24 januari 2006 21:12

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   U.N.: Countries must be prepared for 'inevitable' pandemic
   
   BRADLEY S. KLAPPER, Associated Press Writer
   
   January 24, 2006 11:43 AM
   
   GENEVA (AP) - Countries must speed up preparations to deal with an ''inevitable'' human influenza pandemic, which could strike soon, a senior U.N. official warned Tuesday.
   
   David Nabarro, the U.N. coordinator on avian and human influenza, said countries must work fast because the H5N1 strain of bird flu could mutate into a form that spreads easily between people much faster than some officials seem to believe.
   
   Experts fear that a mutation in the bird flu virus, which has ravaged poultry stocks across Asia since late 2003 and killed at least 82 people worldwide, could spark a pandemic killing millions of people.
   
   ''I say to them please act as though it's going to start tomorrow. Don't keep putting off the difficult issues,'' Nabarro said on the sidelines of the World Health Organization's annual weeklong executive board meeting.
   
   ''It may not be months, it could mean we are going to get human-to-human transmission tomorrow,'' he said.
   
   Meer op: www.newspress.com/Top/Article/article...
   
   
3. [verwijderd] 24 januari 2006 21:44

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   De UN waarschuwt en de WHO waarschuwt; beide organisaties denk ik die eerder te voorzichtig zijn dan overdrijven. Aan de andere kant willen ze wel geld hebben van overheden om hun programma´s te kunnen uitvoeren. Ik weet het niet, ik heb het onbevestigde vermoeden dat ze meer weten dat er bekend wordt gemaakt.De publieke opinie wordt voorbereid?
   
   WHO denies exaggerating bird flu pandemic threat
   Mon Jan 23, 2006 3:04 PM ET
   
   GENEVA (Reuters) - The World Health Organization (WHO) denied on Monday it was exaggerating the risk of a human influenza pandemic, while China reported a 10th person had been diagnosed with the potentially fatal bird flu virus.
   
   WHO director-general Lee Jong-Wook said the threat of a pandemic was a genuine one.
   
   "Concern has been expressed that we are overplaying this threat. We are not," Lee said in an opening speech to the WHO's executive board, holding a week-long meeting in Geneva.
   
   "We can only reduce the devastating human and economic impact of a pandemic if we all take the threat seriously now and prepare thoroughly. This is a global problem," he said.
   
   The United Nations agency has predicted between two and 7.4 million people could die if a pandemic sweeps the world.
   
   Unlike in East Asia -- where outbreaks had been detected in poultry well ahead of human cases -- the "unique feature" in Turkey had been "almost no prior warning of infection in poultry", said Lee, a South Korean doctor.
   
   "The Turkey experience demonstrates the dangers poised by avian influenza in birds and the vital importance of surveillance and effective early warning systems," he added.
   
   "A pandemic could arise with little or no warning from the animal side."
   
   today.reuters.com/news/NewsArticle.as...
   
   
4. [verwijderd] 24 januari 2006 21:51

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   Vogelgriep, wetenschappelijk beschreven, echt standaard artikel:
   
   www.chestjournal.org/cgi/content/shor...
   
   Avian Influenza Virus Infections in Humans*
   
   Samson S. Y. Wong, MRCPath and Kwok-yung Yuen, MD
   * From the Department of Microbiology, Research Centre of Infection and Immunology, State Key Laboratory of Emerging Infectious Disease, Faculty of Medicine, The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong.
   
   Correspondence to: Kwok-yung Yuen, MD, Department of Microbiology, The University of Hong Kong, University Pathology Building, Queen Mary Hospital, 102 Pokfulam Rd, Hong Kong; e-mail: hkumicro@hkucc.hku.hk
   
   Abstract
   
   Seroepidemiologic and virologic studies since 1889 suggested that human influenza pandemics were caused by H1, H2, and H3 subtypes of influenza A viruses. If not for the 1997 avian A/H5N1 outbreak in Hong Kong of China, subtype H2 is the likely candidate for the next pandemic. However, unlike previous poultry outbreaks of highly pathogenic avian influenza due to H5 that were controlled by depopulation with or without vaccination, the presently circulating A/H5N1 genotype Z virus has since been spreading from Southern China to other parts of the world.
   
   Migratory birds and, less likely, bird trafficking are believed to be globalizing the avian influenza A/H5N1 epidemic in poultry.
   
   More than 200 human cases of avian influenza virus infection due to A/H5, A/H7, and A/H9 subtypes mainly as a result of poultry-to-human transmission have been reported with a > 50% case fatality rate for A/H5N1 infections.
   
   A mutant or reassortant virus capable of efficient human-to-human transmission could trigger another influenza pandemic. The recent isolation of this virus in extrapulmonary sites of human diseases suggests that the high fatality of this infection may be more than just the result of a cytokine storm triggered by the pulmonary disease.
   
   The emergence of resistance to adamantanes (amantadine and rimantadine) and recently oseltamivir while H5N1 vaccines are still at the developmental stage of phase I clinical trial are causes for grave concern.
   
   Moreover, the to-be pandemic strain may have little cross immunogenicity to the presently tested vaccine strain. The relative importance and usefulness of airborne, droplet, or contact precautions in infection control are still uncertain. Laboratory-acquired avian influenza H7N7 has been reported, and the laboratory strains of human influenza H2N2 could also be the cause of another pandemic. The control of this impending disaster requires more research in addition to national and international preparedness at various levels.
   
   The epidemiology, virology, clinical features, laboratory diagnosis, management, and hospital infection control measures are reviewed from a clinical perspective.
   
   
5. [verwijderd] 24 januari 2006 22:01

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   De eerste reactie van overheden op een voorval is vaak: " niets aan de hand, gaat u rustig slapen"
   
   De "chef vogelgriep" van de Verenigde Naties zegt wat anders:
   
   Nabarro: I worry every day about human-to-human transmission
   
   HLT-UN-AVIAN FLU
   Nabarro: I worry every day about human-to-human transmission
   
   (With Photos) GENEVA, Jan 24 (KUNA) -- Senior UN System Coordinator for Avian and Human Influenza Dr. David Nabarro noted to reporters tUESDAY that he worries every day from receiving the news of a human to human transmission of the Avian Flu.
   
   Asked by the Kuwait News Agency (KUNA) whether he is freaking out from that possibility, Nabarro said in a news briefing in Geneva that he worries every morning as he starts his day with reviewing his e-mails from this development unfolding.
   
   Nabarro said that "we are all standing on a deep edge and not knowing how far we are going to fall" when it happens.
   
   This is why, he added, everybody is focused on getting ready, because if preparation is not done before the crisis, then it is too late.
   
   He stressed that those who say the moment the pandemic starts its too late to get prepared, and noted that those people are absolutely right.
   
   "Not only I am 'freaking out', to use the correspondents expression, and not mine, not only is that worry or anxiety because of the impact of a possible pandemic, but there is also that worry and anxiety because so many people when I talk to them about getting prepared seem to imply that we have months ahead to get prepared," he said.
   
   However he added that "I say to them it might not be months, it could be that we get human to human transmission tomorrow, so please act as though it is going to start tomorrow, don't keep putting off the difficult issues".
   
   www.kuna.net.kw/Home/Story.aspx?Langu...
   
   
   
6. [verwijderd] 25 januari 2006 08:11

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   Austria seeks EU crisis stock of bird flu drugs
   
   >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
   But it said countries needed to do more to share the risks of the development of vaccines.
   
   In a submission to the WHO’s executive board, the International Federation of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers and Associations called for the establishment of public-private partnerships to spread the costs between companies and governments for vaccines that may never be commercialised.
   
   The association has also called for a significant increase in the use of seasonal flu vaccines by governments, which would help boost manufacturing capacity that could be switched at short notice to the production of a pandemic vaccine when necessary.
   
   Only nine countries produce a global capacity of 300m doses of seasonal vaccine, which creates shortfalls and raises ethical issues about how poorer nations and those without manufacturing facilities could gain access to protection during a pandemic.
   
   >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
   
   Austria seeks EU crisis stock of bird flu drugs
   >By Raphael Minder in Brussels and Andrew Jack in London
   >Published: January 24 2006 18:57 | Last updated: January 24 2006 18:57
   >>
   The European Union needs to create a common stock of antivirals to combat a possible bird flu outbreak in one or more of its 25 member states, according to the health minister of Austria, which holds the EU’s rotating presidency.
   
   Maria Rauch-Kallat said that she would revive the idea of a crisis EU stock at a meeting of health ministers in Vienna in April.
   
   She said: “We are thinking about a crisis stock to help directly if one country faced a real problem. It would be very useful, because no country can afford to give up from its own stock to help another.’’
   
   She also said that it would “probably be better’’ if the EU crisis stock was under the supervision of, and handled by, the Geneva-based World Health Organisation rather than the European Commission in Brussels, which had no experience and more limited resources to handle such a challenging task.
   
   Earlier this month EU officials shelved the idea of creating a common stockpile of antivirals to deal with a possible bird flu crisis, insisting that the risk of a pandemic in Europe remained low.
   
   The stockpiling could raise serious logistical and financial difficulties, but the issue has also sparked political controversy over how much EU countries should let Brussels co-ordinate the EU’s response to bird flu, which has recently been spreading in Turkey.
   
   Separately, the pharmaceutical industry said that at least 28 prototype pandemic flu vaccines were under development by 13 companies, designed to provide protection from six different potential pandemic strains.
   
   >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
   But it said countries needed to do more to share the risks of the development of vaccines.
   
   In a submission to the WHO’s executive board, the International Federation of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers and Associations called for the establishment of public-private partnerships to spread the costs between companies and governments for vaccines that may never be commercialised.
   
   The association has also called for a significant increase in the use of seasonal flu vaccines by governments, which would help boost manufacturing capacity that could be switched at short notice to the production of a pandemic vaccine when necessary.
   
   Only nine countries produce a global capacity of 300m doses of seasonal vaccine, which creates shortfalls and raises ethical issues about how poorer nations and those without manufacturing facilities could gain access to protection during a pandemic.
   >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
   The association stressed that it would need “clear and unambiguous” signals about when to switch from seasonal to pandemic vaccine production, which required the creation of a formalised universal decision-making process yet to be established.
   
   The EU has created a public-private partnership, but, in practice, funding to support pandemic vaccine development so far remains extremely scant, with modest sums from a few countries, including Germany.
   
7. [verwijderd] 25 januari 2006 08:17

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   >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
   If this threat becomes a reality, each vaccine-producing nation will without a doubt act on its national selfishness and first try to solve its own problems, and only then open its doors to other nations to its production," he told state radio RDP
   >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
   
   Portugal to start domestic flu vaccine production Tue Jan 24, 1:02 PM ET
   
   
   LISBON (AFP) - Portugal will begin producing its own flu vaccines in 2007 better to prepare for a possible global pandemic of deadly bird flu in the future, Health Minister Antonio Correia de Campos said.
   
   ADVERTISEMENT
   
   Portuguese pharmaceutical company Medinfar plans to build the nation's first flu vaccine production factory which will be able to produce a vaccine against bird flu when one becomes available, the minister said.
   
   "If this threat becomes a reality, each vaccine-producing nation will without a doubt act on its national selfishness and first try to solve its own problems, and only then open its doors to other nations to its production," he told state radio RDP.
   
   "Being alert is not enough, we have to be alert and prepared," he added.
   
   Medinfar said in a statement it would spend some 27 million euros (33 million dollars) to build the factory ,which should be able to provide Portugal, a nation of just over 10 million, with 63 percent of its flu vaccine needs by 2008.
   
   The H5N1 bird flu virus has affected poultry flocks in the Far East and Turkey, and has claimed some 80 human lives after spreading from birds to people.
   
   But experts fear the virus could mutate almost overnight and unobserved into a new form that would spread easily between humans and spark a repeat of the global influenza pandemics that killed tens of millions of people in the past century.
   
   The World Health Organisation is pressing governments to have rapid quarantine plans in place in the event of a pandemic.
   
8. [verwijderd] 25 januari 2006 09:25

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   4 verdachte gevallen in Oran, Algerije, 1 dode, resultaten onderzoek over een week:
   
   Suspicion de trois cas de grippe aviaire à Oran
   
   Depuis avant-hier soir, trois personnes sont en observation au niveau du service des maladies infectieuses du CHU d’Oran, isolées du reste des patients. Elles seraient atteintes d’une grippe dont on ignore l’origine. Les trois patients appartiennent à une même famille : deux frères en bas âge et leur oncle.
   
   le père de ces deux enfants est décédé trois jours auparavant, de la même maladie, semble-t-il. Selon une source digne de foi, le défunt aurait développé une hémorragie au niveau des poumons. Les premières analyses effectuées par le laboratoire central du CHU d’Oran écarteraient l’hypothèse d’une atteinte tuberculeuse.
   
   Des souches des malades hospitalisés ont été toutefois envoyées à l’institut Pasteur pour des analyses virologiques. Selon un responsable du CHU d’Oran, les résultats de ces analyses ne seront connus que dans une semaine.
   
   www.jeune-independant.com/display.php...
   
9. [verwijderd] 25 januari 2006 12:02

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   Manufacturers Plan to Ramp Up Flu Vaccine
   
   By MIKE STOBBE, AP Medical Writer
   Tue Jan 24, 8:22 PM ET
   
   
   ATLANTA - Expecting rising demand for flu shots, pharmaceutical companies are gearing up to produce as many as 120 million doses of vaccine for next flu season.
   
   That far surpasses the record of 95 million doses produced in 2002.
   
   Vaccine makers say their expectation seems warranted for a number of reasons, including public fears of bird flu, better government reimbursement for shots and indications that federal health officials may one day recommend flu shots for nearly everyone.
   
   "We and other manufacturers are making the investments to ensure that there will be sustainable supplies going forward," said Andrew MacKnight, executive director of vaccine supply for GlaxoSmithKline, speaking at a flu vaccine summit meeting in Atlanta on Tuesday.
   
   The manufacturers' projections could mean an end to the shortages that have worried patients and health care workers for the past three autumns.
   
   "It's good news," said Glen Nowak, a spokesman for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
   
   Glaxo, which produced 7.5 million doses of flu vaccine last year, said it expects to distribute between 20 million and 30 million in the 2006-07 flu season. The company recently acquired plants in Canada and Pennsylvania and is expanding its plants in Dresden, Germany.
   
   Sanofi Pasteur, the main vaccine producer for the 2005-06 season, broke ground last July on a vaccine plant in Swiftwater, Pa., to double the company's capacity.
   
   The predictions were made at a two-day meeting in Atlanta to discuss the vaccine supply. It was co-hosted by the CDC and the American Medical Association.
   
   Between 5 percent and 20 percent of the U.S. population gets the flu each year, according to the AMA. The illness leads to about 36,000 deaths and 200,000 hospitalizations each year, according to federal officials.
   
   The CDC recommends flu vaccinations for groups most at risk of complications, including the elderly and people with weakened immune systems. CDC officials said Tuesday they may expand the recommendation to include most young children.
   
   About 86 million doses of vaccine were produced for the current season in the United States, up from about 61 million in the 2004-05 flu season, according to the CDC.
   
   news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060125/
   ap_on_he_me/vaccine_supply;_ylt=ApvtWkbcxVJKvwEyU32FQves0NUE;_ylu=X3oDMTA3czJjNGZoBHNlYwM3NTE-
10. [verwijderd] 25 januari 2006 15:09

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    Algeria denies report of human bird flu death
    25 Jan 2006 12:55:
    
    ALGIERS, Jan 25 (Reuters) - Algeria denied any outbreak of bird flu on Wednesday after newspaper reports that a poultry breeder in the western city of Oran may have died of the virus.
    
    Newspaper El Watan said the farmer had shown flu-like symptoms before he died and that three of his relatives had been treated in hospital.
    
    But a health ministry official told Reuters the results of initial blood tests on the family were negative for bird flu, the deadly virus that has killed more than 80 people since it reemerged at the end of 2003.
    "I deny the existence of any suspected (bird flu) cases. The hospitalised people have been suffering from normal (seasonal) flu. This has nothing to do with the bird flu virus, according to preliminary tests," the official said.
    
    The results of final tests on the family would be released by Sunday, he added.
    
    www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L25...
    
    Normale reaktie van de autoriteiten: "niets aan de hand". Wordt vervolgd.
    
    Oran is o.a. van belang omdat er uitgestrekte Wetlands zijn, die een pleisterplaats vormen voor trekvogels op weg zijn naar Europa.
    
    www.birdlife.org/datazone/sites/?acti...
    
    
11. [verwijderd] 25 januari 2006 17:12

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    Roche says now shipping Tamiflu to all markets _
    24 Jan 2006 17:51:00 GMT
    
    Source: Reuters
    
    By Lisa Richwine
    
    WASHINGTON, Jan 24 (Reuters) - Swiss drug maker Roche Holding AG <ROG.VX> said on Tuesday it had lifted restrictions on shipments of influenza drug Tamiflu that were put in place to prevent hoarding by consumers worried about bird flu.
    
    Roche said it was now shipping the oral drug to all markets to fight the seasonal flu widespread in several U.S. states.
    
    The company said it previously was distributing Tamiflu only to U.S. cities where a high incidence of influenza was being reported.
    
    Roche said it boosted shipments after seeing an increase in flu reports in the United States and a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention advisory to doctors to avoid using two older flu drugs this season.
    
    "We are prepared to meet seasonal demand for Tamiflu, including any increase stemming from CDC's recent announcement," George Abercrombie, president and chief executive of Roche unit Hoffmann-La Roche Inc., said in a statement.
    
    Gilead Sciences Inc. <GILD.O> invented Tamiflu and receives royalties on sales of the drug, which also is known by the generic name oseltamivir.
    www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N24...
12. [verwijderd] 26 januari 2006 09:36

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    Scientists follow the money to predict epidemics
    
    25 Jan 2006 17:59:07 GMT
    
    Source: Reuters
    
    By Patricia Reaney
    
    LONDON, Jan 25 (Reuters) - A popular U.S. Web site that tracks the geographical circulation of money could offer new insights into predicting the spread of infectious diseases like bird flu.
    
    Money, like diseases, is carried by people around the world, so what better way to plot the spread of a potential influenza pandemic than to track the circulation of dollar bills, researchers reasoned.
    
    Researchers in Germany and the United States did just that to develop a mathematical model of human travel that can be used to plot the spread of future pandemics.
    
    "There are some universal rules governing human travel and they can be used to develop a new class of model for the spread of infectious disease," said Dr Dirk Brockmann, a physicist at the Max Planck Institute for Dynamics and Self-Organisation in Gottingen, Germany.
    
    Health experts fear the H5N1 bird flu virus that has killed at least 82 people in six countries since 2003 could mutate into a highly infectious strain in humans that could cause the next pandemic.
    
    "We can now plug in the parameter ranges that we think will apply to influenza and then simulate a pandemic that runs through Europe and see what happens," said Brockmann, who reported the findings in the journal Nature on Wednesday.
    
    In addition to giving insights into how an infectious disease would spread, mathematical models and computer simulations could help to develop measures to take against it, he added.
    
    WHERE IS GEORGE?
    
    Human movement is a main cause of the spread of infectious disease but with modern-day travel involving boats, planes, trains, cars and other means of transport it is virtually impossible to compile a comprehensive set of data on travel.
    
    The scientists analysed information from www.wheresgeorge.com, an online bill-tracking Internet site. Users, most of whom mark their bills with the Web site address, register on the site and follow the trail of their money after they spend it.
    
    About 50 million banknotes have been registered on the site, according to Brockmann.
    
    The information from the site enabled the researchers to develop a mathematical theory of human travel behaviour. When they compared their results with traffic flow of aviation networks in the United States, they found it correlated very closely.
    
    "This is a very good estimate of how humans travel," Brockmann said.
    
    "The things that we observed in the United States may also be valid for Europe or Canada. If that is so, we can develop models for the spread of infectious disease that can reveal universal characteristics of modern pandemics," he added.
    
    www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L23...
13. [verwijderd] 26 januari 2006 12:01

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    GSK
    
    Drug Co. to Begin Bird Flu Clinical Trials
    
    10 minutes ago
    
    
    DAVOS, Switzerland - Drug maker GlaxoSmithKline PLC hopes to start clinical trials in early April for its vaccine against the deadly H5N1 bird flu strain, a company executive said Thursday.
    
    
    The London-based company would test the vaccine with two different boosters and the first results should come about three months later, said David Stout, president of the company's pharmaceutical operations.
    
    Production is slated to start by year's end, he said on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum's annual meeting.
    
    GlaxoSmithKline has submitted a mock-up dossier to the European Agency for the Evaluation of Medicinal Products, or EMEA, seeking an outline approval to market a vaccine against pandemic flu.
    
    The mock-up process requires companies to conduct clinical trials for safety and to establish the dosage and schedule for core compounds to obtain quick authorization for pandemic vaccines.
    
    The company submitted an adjuvant tested in the mock-up file the company has submitted to the European regulator, Stout said.
    
    An adjuvant stimulates a person's immune response to an infection to help make a vaccine work.
    
    "We know one adjuvant works, and we have a second adjuvant," Stout said. "We believe, based on studies we have done, it will work even better."
    
    "We are going to take both formulations in the clinic in early April, so that we will know we'll be able to pick between the two, and should be able to start production by the end of the year," Stout added.
    
    The company is starting production of its traditional flu vaccine in the next couple of weeks for the next influenza season, Stout said.
    
    "If a pandemic breaks out, we would be able to stop production of the traditional flu vaccine and start production of the pandemic vaccine," he said. "We could start production on a risk basis (without regulatory approval) if that was necessary."
    
    news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060126/ap_on_he...
    world_forum_gsk_bird_flu;_ylt=AuR3y0q52OgBEtgy.DovSyOs0NUE;_ylu=X3oDMTA3czJjNGZoBHNlYwM3NTE-
14. [verwijderd] 26 januari 2006 12:16

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    Flu Vaccine 2006-2007 Strains To Be Determined By Advisory Cmte. Feb. 17
    
    Influenza virus strains to be included in the vaccine for the 2006-2007 flu season will be discussed by FDA’s Vaccines & Related Biological Products Advisory Committee Feb. 17.
    
    During last February’s deliberations for the 2005-2006 flu season, the committee recommended retaining the previous flu season’s A/New Caledonia/20/99 (H1N1)-like strain and switching to an A/California/7/2004 (H3N2)-like strain from the previous A/Fujian/411/2002-like strain.
    
    The committee also recommended keeping the same influenza B strain, the Yamagata lineage B/Shanghai/361/2002-like strain. The committee also suggested the development of a bivalent B strain vaccine for pediatric patients, who do not get cross protection from a single B strain.
    
    Since last year’s advisory committee meeting, two companies have entered the U.S. influenza vaccine market.
    
    GlaxoSmithKline could launch two vaccines for the 2006-2007 season. FDA approved GSK’s flu vaccine Fluarix in August. A month later, the firm announced plans to buy Fluviral maker ID Biomedical; the company has said it hopes to have the vaccine approved by the 2007 flu season.
    
    Novartis also entered the flu vaccine market with its acquisition of U.K.-based Chiron, which manufactures the flu vaccine Fluvirin. Fluvirin manufacturing was halted in 2004 due to good manufacturing practice deviations at its Liverpool facility. Chiron was cleared to recommence manufacture of the vaccine in September.
    
    Other flu vaccines include Sanofi Pasteur’s Fluzone and Medimmune’s intranasal FluMist.
    
    To watch a webcast of this meeting, click the button below. To arrange for live videoconferencing, or to order videotapes & DVDs, email FDATV@elsevier.com or call 800-627-8171.
    Posted: Thursday, January 26, 2006
    
    www.fdaadvisorycommittee.com/FDC/Advi...
    Committees/Vaccines+and+Related+Biological+Products/021706_Flu/021706_Flu.htm
15. [verwijderd] 26 januari 2006 19:18

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    WHO backs early adoption of bird flu rules
    26 Jan 2006 17:35:51 GMT
    
    Source: Reuters
    
    By Stephanie Nebehay
    
    GENEVA, Jan 26 (Reuters) - International rules obliging countries to report human cases of bird flu promptly and share data could be brought forward to come into effect this year, the World Health Organisation (WHO) said on Thursday.
    
    The regulations, which include powers to monitor and quarantine international passengers and cargo, were approved by the United Nations health agency last year to come into effect in mid-2007.
    
    But a number of countries, led by Canada, pressed at this week's meeting of the WHO's executive board for the date to be brought forward because of a rising threat from bird flu.
    
    The proposal was backed by the 32-state executive on Thursday, but must still be ratified by the WHO's annual assembly of 192 member states in May. If accepted, application of the rules will be voluntary in the first year.
    
    "This resolution, while not legally-binding, will put pressure on countries...It is a call for compliance," Max Hardiman, WHO's project leader, told Reuters in an interview.
    
    "It gives us a very clear mandate to tell countries 'you must give us the information that you have of cases,'" he said.
    
    Shigeru Omi, WHO's Western Pacific regional director, told the talks on Tuesday that Asian countries had lagged in reporting some human cases of bird flu and this could jeopardise the chances of swiftly containing any potential pandemic.
    
    Bird flu has killed at least 83 people in six countries since late 2003. The H5N1 virus is not known to pass easily between humans at the moment, but experts fear it could develop that ability and set off a pandemic that might kill millions.
    
    Japan, the United States, the European Union (EU) and Russia this week backed early adoption of the rules for bird flu.
    
    "There is a high degree of support for voluntary compliance with the International Health Regulations. It will help countries to build capacity," Margaret Chan, the WHO's top pandemic official, told the talks.
    
    "Whatever resources we invest now would not go to waste. This will come back to serve our long-term interests of global health security," she added.
    
    Current international health rules, dating back to 1969, cover only three diseases -- cholera, plague and yellow fever.
    
    The new rules -- prompted by the outbreak of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) which killed some 800 people in 2003 -- require reporting any event that may constitute a public health emergency of international concern.
    www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L26...
16. [verwijderd] 27 januari 2006 09:13

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    Ik ben nog niet echt wakker, maar hadden we deze al?
    
    Public release date: 26-Jan-2006
    [ Print Article | E-mail Article | Close Window ]
    
    University of Pittsburgh Medical Center
    
    Vaccine provides 100 percent protection against avian flu virus in animal study
    
    PITTSBURGH, Jan. 26 – University of Pittsburgh researchers announced they have genetically engineered an avian flu vaccine from the critical components of the deadly H5N1 virus that completely protected mice and chickens from infection. Avian flu has devastated bird populations in Southeast Asia and Europe and so far has killed more than 80 people.
    
    Because this vaccine contains a live virus, it may be more immune-activating than avian flu vaccines prepared by traditional methods, say the researchers. Furthermore, because it is grown in cells, it can be produced much more quickly than traditional vaccines, making it an extremely attractive candidate for preventing the spread of the virus in domestic livestock populations and, potentially, in humans, according to the study, published in the Feb 15 issue of the Journal of Virology and made available early online.
    
    "The results of this animal trial are very promising, not only because our vaccine completely protected animals that otherwise would have died, but also because we found that one form of the vaccine stimulates several lines of immunity against H5N1," said Andrea Gambotto, M.D., assistant professor in the departments of surgery and molecular genetics and biochemistry, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, and lead author of the study.
    
    Dr. Gambotto and his colleagues constructed the vaccine by genetically engineering a common cold virus, called adenovirus, to express either all or parts of an avian influenza protein called hemagglutinin (HA) on its surface. Found on the surface of all influenza viruses, HA allows the virus to attach to the cell that is being infected and is, therefore, critical to the influenza virus' ability to cause illness and death.
    
    Based on the published sequence of the Vietnam strain of the H5N1 avian influenza virus, members of the University of Pittsburgh Vector Core Facility, led by Wentao Gao, Ph.D., research instructor in the School of Medicine's department of surgery, constructed several adenovirus "vectors"--viruses that have been modified to serve as a vector, or delivery vehicle, for foreign genes or DNA--containing either the full genetic sequence of the HA protein or sequences for only parts, or subunits, of HA. They also constructed a vector containing sequences for a portion of the HA protein from the H5N1 Hong Kong strain.
    
    All of the mice immunized with the empty vector vaccine experienced substantial weight loss beginning about three days after exposure to wild-type H5N1, and all were dead within six to nine days of avian flu exposure. In sharp contrast, most of the mice immunized with the adenovirus containing either the whole or part of the HA protein showed only mild and short-lived weight loss and survived H5N1 infection.
    Moreover, when they looked at the cellular immune response to vaccination, they found that all of the animals immunized with full-length HA or the subunit vaccines developed strong cellular immune responses. However, only the full-length HA-immunized mice developed strong T-cell responses to both of the HA subunits. According to Simon Barratt-Boyes, B.V.Sc., Ph.D., associate professor, department of infectious diseases and microbiology, University of Pittsburgh Graduate School of Public Health, and one of the co-authors of the study, the ability of this particular recombinant vaccine--a vaccine carrying only the important immune-stimulating proteins--to induce both antibody- and T cell-directed immunity is extremely encouraging.
    
    "This means that this recombinant vaccine can stimulate several lines of defense against the H5N1 virus, giving it greater therapeutic value. More importantly, it suggests that even if H5N1 mutates, the vaccine is still likely to be effective against it. How effective, we are not sure," Dr. Barratt-Boyes cautioned. "We won't know until that occurs."
    
    "It takes a little over a month for us to develop a recombinant vector vaccine compared to a minimum of several months via traditional methods," he explained. "This capacity will be particularly invaluable if the virus begins to mutate rapidly, a phenomenon that often limits the ability of traditional vaccines to contain outbreaks of mutant strains." Dr. Gambotto added that his group is planning a small clinical trial of the vaccine in humans in the very near future.
    
    Meer op:
    
    www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2006-...
    
    Zelfde team was ook aktief ivm een SARS vaccin:
    
    www.pittsburghlive.com/x/tribune-revi...
    
    
17. [verwijderd] 27 januari 2006 09:38

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    Gesproken wordt over: Cell based / human cells
    
    New bird flu shot took just a month to make -study
    
    26 Jan 2006 23:39:37 GMT
    
    WASHINGTON, Jan 26 (Reuters) - A new bird flu vaccine made using cleaner technology took just a month to make and completely protected chickens from the deadly H5N1 virus, U.S. researchers reported on Thursday.
    
    The genetically engineered vaccine appears to fulfill the promise of modern influenza vaccine technology being pushed by public health experts who want to improve the slow, old-fashioned methods now used to fight the flu.
    
    The team at the University of Pittsburgh is now putting together a plan to test the vaccine in humans.
    
    www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N26...
    "This is a very potent vaccine," Dr. Andrea Gambotto of the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, who led the study, said in a phone interview. "It took roughly about 30 days to make the vaccine from when we received the sequence information from CDC in Atlanta."
    
    Current influenza vaccines for both chickens and humans take months to make and are grown in chicken eggs. Production is uncertain and the vaccines do not provide perfect protection.
    
    Experts agree the way to go is cell-based production --
    
    growing the vaccine in batches of human cells grown in the lab instead of in eggs.
    
    Several shortages of vaccine for the seasonal flu made this need even more dire. But the spread of the H5N1 virus has made the need for better vaccine technology urgent.
    
    H5N1 affects mostly birds but it has infected more than 150 people and killed more than 80 of them. Experts fear it could acquire the ability to pass from person to person, sparking a pandemic that could kill millions around the globe.
    
    Because no one knows just how H5N1 will mutate, experts say it will not be possible to start making a vaccine against it until the pandemic strain emerges.
    
    Gambotto hopes his team's approach will provide a way to start making such a vaccine quickly.
    
    FROM E-MAIL TO A VACCINE
    
    They did not use the actual H5N1 virus -- just genetic sequence data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. "We have the technique to go from an e-mail to a virus," Gambotto said.
    
    They artificially generated the DNA coding for the hemagglutinin gene -- which controls a protein found on the surface of all influenza viruses and provides the "H" in a virus's name.
    
    "We generated the portion that we think was important for immunity," Gambotto said. "We never manipulated the actual H5N1 virus ourselves, so it is safe to generate this kind of vaccine."
    
    They then spliced this artificial DNA into a human adenovirus, a common cold virus.
    
    Tests in mice and chickens showed it provided partial protection when given nasally, and 100 percent protection against H5N1 when injected, they report in the Feb. 15 issue of the Journal of Virology.
    
    And it produced what is known as a dual immunological response -- the body generated both antibodies to neutralize the virus, and T-cells, a kind of immune cell that also attacks viruses.
    
    "That means there is a lot of chance of getting cross-reactivity," Gambotto said. In other words, the vaccine may work against mutated versions of the flu virus, something current vaccines cannot do. This is why the flu vaccine now must be reformulated every year.
    
    Gambotto also hopes the nasal vaccine might work better in people than it did in animals, because the vaccine uses a live human adenovirus.
    
    His team is working with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to get approval to move ahead with human trials.
    
    The University has the technology to make and test its own vaccines. "Eventually we will need to partner with a company for large-scale production of vaccine," Gambotto said.
    
18. [verwijderd] 27 januari 2006 09:43

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    quote:

    Gert50 schreef:

    Because this vaccine contains a live virus, it may be more immune-activating than avian flu vaccines prepared by traditional methods, say the researchers. Furthermore, because it is grown in cells, it can be produced much more quickly than traditional vaccines, making it an extremely attractive candidate for preventing the spread of the virus in domestic livestock populations and, potentially, in humans, according to the study, published in the Feb 15 issue of the Journal of Virology and made available early online.
    

    grown in cells,produced more quickly....
    Over welke cellijn heeft men het hier?
    Klinkt als concurrerende met PerC6.
    
    mvg ivet
19. [verwijderd] 27 januari 2006 09:43

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    Journal of Virology, February 2006, p. 1959-1964, Vol. 80, No. 4
    0022-538X/06/$08.00+0 doi:10.1128/JVI.80.4.1959-1964.2006
    Copyright © 2006, American Society for Microbiology. All Rights Reserved.
    
    Protection of Mice and Poultry from Lethal H5N1 Avian Influenza Virus through Adenovirus-Based Immunization
    Wentao Gao,1, Adam C. Soloff,4, Xiuhua Lu,5, Angela Montecalvo,1 Doan C. Nguyen,5 Yumi Matsuoka,5 Paul D. Robbins,2 David E. Swayne,6 Ruben O. Donis,5 Jacqueline M. Katz,5 Simon M. Barratt-Boyes,4 and Andrea Gambotto1,2,3*
    Departments of Surgery,1 Molecular Genetics and Biochemistry,2 Medicine, Division of Infectious Diseases, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 15261,3 Department of Infectious Diseases and Microbiology, Graduate School of Public Health, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 15261,4 Influenza Branch, National Center for Infectious Diseases, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Atlanta, Georgia 30333,5 Southeast Poultry Research Laboratory, Agricultural Research Service, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Athens, Georgia 306056
    
    Received 24 October 2005/ Accepted 2 December 2005
    
    The recent emergence of highly pathogenic avian influenza virus (HPAI) strains in poultry and their subsequent transmission to humans in Southeast Asia have raised concerns about the potential pandemic spread of lethal disease. In this paper we describe the development and testing of an adenovirus-based influenza A virus vaccine directed against the hemagglutinin (HA) protein of the A/Vietnam/1203/2004 (H5N1) (VN/1203/04) strain isolated during the lethal human outbreak in Vietnam from 2003 to 2005. We expressed different portions of HA from a recombinant replication-incompetent adenoviral vector, achieving vaccine production within 36 days of acquiring the virus sequence. BALB/c mice were immunized with a prime-boost vaccine and exposed to a lethal intranasal dose of VN/1203/04 H5N1 virus 70 days later. Vaccination induced both HA-specific antibodies and cellular immunity likely to provide heterotypic immunity. Mice vaccinated with full-length HA were fully protected from challenge with VN/1203/04. We next evaluated the efficacy of adenovirus-based vaccination in domestic chickens, given the critical role of fowl species in the spread of HPAI worldwide. A single subcutaneous immunization completely protected chickens from an intranasal challenge 21 days later with VN/1203/04, which proved lethal to all control-vaccinated chickens within 2 days. These data indicate that the rapid production and subsequent administration of recombinant adenovirus-based vaccines to both birds and high-risk individuals in the face of an outbreak may serve to control the pandemic spread of lethal avian influenza.
    
    --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
    * Corresponding author. Mailing address: Departments of Surgery and Medicine, Division of Infectious Diseases, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, Molecular Medicine Institute, Suite 412, 300 Technology Drive, Pittsburgh, PA 15219. Phone: (412) 383-7684. Fax: (412) 383-9760. E-mail: agamb@pitt.edu.
    
    These authors contributed equally to this work.
    
    Journal of Virology, February 2006, p. 1959-1964, Vol. 80, No. 4
    0022-538X/06/$08.00+0 doi:10.1128/JVI.80.4.1959-1964.2006
    Copyright © 2006, American Society for Microbiology. All Rights Reserved.
20. [verwijderd] 27 januari 2006 09:44

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    En art. uit 2005:
    
    Speedier vaccine for avian flu threat
    Friday, February 25, 2005
    
    By Byron Spice, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
    
    As international health officials voice rising concern about a possible bird flu pandemic, University of Pittsburgh researchers are wrapping up preliminary tests of an experimental vaccine for the disease.
    
    A number of bird flu vaccines are under study around the world, but the vaccine developed by Dr. Andrea Gambotto and his Pitt colleagues is a type that potentially could be produced rapidly in response to an outbreak.
    
    Testing in mice and chickens, which involves checking the vaccinated animals' blood for antibodies and cellular response against the virus, should be complete in the next few weeks, said Gambotto, whose team is collaborating with researchers at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
    
    An outbreak of an avian influenza strain known as H5N1 began in January 2004 and has spread through eight Asian countries. Millions of chickens, ducks and other birds are infected and thus far 42 people in Thailand, Vietnam and Cambodia have died.
    
    Those victims all appear to have contracted the disease through direct contact with the birds, but health officials worry that if the virus mutates so that it can be spread from human to human it could spread quickly around the world.
    
    Dr. Julie Gerberding, CDC director, says the United States is not in immediate danger of an epidemic, but World Health Organization officials earlier this week warned that the risk of a human outbreak has increased sharply and that the world "is now in the gravest possible danger of a pandemic."
    
    The U.S. government has stockpiled anti-viral medications and has ordered 2 million doses of bird flu vaccine from pharmaceutical maker Aventis. Clinical trials of that vaccine, made from an inactivated H5N1 virus, are about to begin.
    
    But Gambotto noted that it remains unclear whether stockpiling vaccine is the best strategy. "The virus as it is now is not the virus that will cause a pandemic," he said, noting that researchers don't know what genetic mutation might ultimately allow for human-to-human transmission.
    
    The vaccine deveoped by Gambotto, immunologist Simon Barratt-Boyes and their Pitt colleagues is a so-called viral vector vaccine. Rather than using a complete, inactivated bird flu virus, they select only certain genes from the virus -- genes that produce proteins that trigger an immune response.
    
    Gambotto is reluctant to identify which gene is used in the vaccine until his findings are published in a scientific journal. But the vaccine is made by combining the gene with the genetic material of a "vector," a common cold virus called an adenovirus that has been modified so that it can't cause disease.
    
    When this vaccine is administered to a patient, the viral machinery causes the bird flu gene to produce its protein, which then stimulates a response by the patient's immune system.
    
    One advantage is that the vaccine can be developed very quickly. Gambotto said it took his team about six weeks to develop the vaccine after the CDC provided the virus's genetic sequence a year ago.
    
    Another advantage of this approach, said David Daigle, a spokesman for the CDC's National Center for Infectious Diseases, is that the viral vector vaccine can be grown much faster than traditional egg-grown flu vaccines, such as the Aventis vaccine.
    
    Vaccines based on licensed technologies are likely to be available most quickly in a pandemic situation, Daigle said. But many different research groups are developing alternative technologies in hopes of finding a faster way of responding to new viral threats and to produce more effective vaccines.
    
    Gambotto's group developed its vaccine using university funding, but must rely on the CDC for so-called "challenge testing," in which vaccinated animals are then infected with the bird flu virus.
    
    Pitt won't have the facilities to safely perform such challenge testing until the Biomedical Science Tower 3, now under construction on Fifth Avenue in Oakland, is complete. The building will house a "hot lab," a Biosafety Level 3 facility funded by the National Institutes of Health that will accommodate animal research.
    
    Daigle said the Pitt vaccine is one of at least 10 different vaccines for which CDC has done some preliminary preclinical work to determine efficacy.
    
    "Vaccines such as Dr. Gambotto's are still in the early proof of concept stages of development," he added.
    
    Gambotto said he ultimately hopes that clinical studies of the vaccine will be performed at UPMC.
    
    Pitt also is working with the U.S. Department of Agriculture to develop the vaccine for use in poultry. Earlier this week, Thailand approved a program to vaccine millions of chickens, ducks, fighting cocks and tropical birds to help control the bird flu.