Insect clue to faster flu vaccines

Tuesday January 5th, 2010

A radical new technique could massively speed up the production of flu vaccines, researchers reported last night.

Austrian researchers say they have managed to produce swine flu vaccine in a ten week period.

Their technique uses insect cells rather than the chicken eggs that are traditionally used for vaccine production.

Manufacturers rushed to produce H1N1 vaccines last year after the emergence of swine flu - but they were not ready until the autumn.

The Austrian researchers said their technique had been shown to be "feasible". The alternative technique might also help avoid the problem of allergic reactions to eggs that prevent some people having vaccines.

Their findings are published in Biotechnology Journal.

The researchers used their technique to produce "virus like" particles, which it is hoped would stimulate defences against flu.

Researcher Florian Krammer, of the University of Natural Resources and Applied Life Sciences in Vienna, said: "Recent outbreaks of influenza highlight the importance of a rapid and sufficient vaccine supply for pandemic and inter pandemic strains.

"However, classical manufacturing methods for vaccines fail to satisfy this demand.

"Our work demonstrates that recombinant influenza virus-like particles are a very fast, safe and efficient alternative to conventional influenza vaccines and represents a significant new approach for newly emerging influenza strains like swine-origin H1N1 or H5N1."

Professor Alois Jungbauer, editor of the journal, said: "Virus-like particles will be one solution to tackle the biological variability of influenza pandemics.

"Mutated strains can be quickly engineered. So in this respect the teams' work is an extremely valuable contribution to modern vaccine production."

Biotechnology Journal, Wiley-Blackwell, 2009, DOI 10.1002/biot.200900267

Tags: Europe | Flu & Viruses | Pharmaceuticals | World Health

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