Virus-Like Particles May Mean Speedier Flu Vaccines 80
We've been talking a lot lately about flu vaccines. Now an anonymous reader sends us to a Technology Review piece on two human trials involving so-called virus-like particle vaccines, which promise to be much faster to churn out than traditional vaccines. (Here's a single-page version but without the useful illustration.) VLP vaccines use a protein shell, grown in either plant or insect cells, that look just like real viruses to the body's immune system but that contain no influenza RNA genetic material. A company called Medicago grows its VLPs in transgenic tobacco plants, while another called Novavax uses "immortalized" cells taken from caterpillars. Providing they pass safety muster, both techniques should be able to produce an influenza vaccine more quickly than current methods, using just the DNA of the virus.
Flu !DNA (Score:4, Insightful)
Sorry to nitpick, but influenza is an RNA virus, not a DNA virus.
I have no clue if this makes a difference in how quickly a vaccine could be made using this technique, but I just needed to get the "Friday Pedantry" out of the way.
Re:I'm surprisde no one's done this before (Score:4, Insightful)
Or, alternatively, they've been trying for a long time without success. FTFA:
But don't roll up your sleeve just yet. Sounds a lot like holographic storage, Duke Nukem Forever, better batteries, flying cars, jet packs, sensible women.
Re:no flu vaccines for me thanks (Score:3, Insightful)
I could have modded you down, but since there is no -1 Wrong moderation, I decided to correct you instead. When you use a vaccine, you ARE relying on your immune system. All vaccines do is help create an immune response in a manner usually safer than the disease. I say usually because vaccines aren't supposed to eliminate all the risk. That's impossible; all reward has risk. Would you rather have, for example, a 1/50,000 chance of getting hurt by the flu, or a 1/1,000,000 chance of getting hurt by the vaccine. Those aren't actual statistics, but you get the idea. It is true that people are hurt by vaccines, and yes, they sometimes die from the vaccine, but the point is that they're safer than not getting vaccinated. I don't know why there has to be this false dichotomy that because a vaccine is not absolutely perfect that it is dangerous. I mean, it would be like claiming that you shouldn't wear a seat belt or use airbags because people have been hurt by those things. They save many, many more than they harm. It is not about eliminating danger, it is about mitigating the danger to lower levels. It is just asinine and illogical to say that because vaccines aren't fairy dust panaceas you shouldn't get one. I hope people realize that the vast, vast majority of this anti-vaccine nonsense has its cultural roots [wikipedia.org] in anti-scientific fear-mongers (lookin' at you, Wakefield), not actual fact.