Vaccine Weekly articles from January 1999

Vaccine Weekly archives from January 1999

First Ingredient Found For Syphilis Vaccine Cocktail.
January 11, 1999... It doesn't work all by itself, but it's a big first step. A University of Washington research team reports that a recombinant enzyme derived from the syphilis bacterium - glycerophosphodiester phosphodiesterase or Gpd - is the best single...

Dengue Virus Model Found.
January 11, 1999... The race to develop dengue virus vaccines just sped up. Researchers at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) report that a strain of interferon-receptor-deficient mice can be infected with the deadly dengue pathogen. ...

HIV-Specific CTL Decay After HAART.
January 11, 1999... Vaccination or immune therapy appears to be a needed adjunct to highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART). Longitudinal studies of eight patients on successful HAART show that HIV specific cytotoxic T-lymphocyte (CTL) responses decay...

Novel RSV Attenuation Yields Live Vaccine Candidate.
January 11, 1999... With respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), you don't know what you've got 'till it's gone. Deletion of a gene encoding a nonstructural protein creates a stable, attenuated RSV that may be an ideal vaccine candidate. The protein is the...

Antibody Revolution Targets STDs, Stomach Viruses, Common Cold.
January 11, 1999... Just as the cold season descends in the U.S., scientists at The Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland, have predicted widely available medicines to stop sexually transmitted diseases (STDs), protect stomachs from gastrointestinal...

Cuba Tests U.S. Vaccine Device in Cooperation with U.S..
January 11, 1999... In a rare show of cooperation between the United States and Cuba, health officials in the communist-run nation introduced an American-made, needle-free vaccine injector that is to be tested on Cubans. "This is a gesture of cooperation by...

U.S. FDA Approves First Vaccine for Lyme Disease.
January 11, 1999... The first vaccine for Lyme disease was approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), offering a defense against the disease. Three injections of LYMErix made by SmithKline Beecham Biologicals have been shown in tests to prevent...

Study Shows How To Fight Low Childhood Immunization.
January 11, 1999... A pilot study for the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) could help vaccine purchasers make decisions and save costs in health care, according to the lead article published in the January 1999 issue of Health Care Management...

Flu Vaccine Poses Small Risk of Paralysis.
January 11, 1999... Influenza vaccinations can raise the risk of people getting a rare temporary paralysis known as Guillian-Barre syndrome by 70 percent to one per million, researchers said in the December 17, 1998, issue of the New England Journal of Medicine....

Rabies Postexposure Treatment Using the Intradermal Purified Duck Embryo Rabies Vaccine in the Philippines.
January 11, 1999... Postexposure Prophylaxis "Rabies Postexposure Treatment Using the Intradermal Purified Duck Embryo Rabies Vaccine in the Philippines." M.E.G. Miranda, B.P. Quiambao, C. Herzog, N.L.J. Miranda and R. Gluck. Research Institute for Tropical...

Rationale for Melanoma Biotherapy by Echovirus/Tumour Vaccines.
January 11, 1999... According to an abstract submitted by the authors to the 17th International Cancer Congress, held August 23-28, 1998, in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, "An aim of the study is to determine melanoma cell immunophenotype and antitumor immunomodulating...

Feasibility of HIV vaccine trials among high risk cohorts in Vancouver.
January 11, 1999... According to an abstract submitted by the authors to the 11th Annual BC HIV/AIDS Conference entitled Surviving and Thriving: Developing Skills and Ideas for Today and Tomorrow - HIV in Canada, held November 23-24, 1998, in Vancouver, British...

Cytokine Release, Inflammation and Respiratory Dysfunction in RSV-Infected Mice.
January 11, 1999... According to an abstract submitted by the authors to the American Thoracic Society, 1998 International Conference, held April 25-29, 1998, in Chicago, Illinois, "A better understanding of the immunopathogenesis of respiratory syncytial virus...

Systemic Administration of rIL-12 Synergistically Enhances the Therapeutic Effect of a TNF Gene-Transduced Cancer Vaccine.
January 11, 1999... According to the authors' abstract of an article published in Gene Therapy, "Interleukin-12 (IL-12) is a potent antitumor cytokine, which induces and enhances the activity of natural killer (NK) cells, lymphokine activated killer (LAK) cells,...

Live Attenuated Simian Immunodeficiency Virus (SIV)mac in Macaques Can Induce Protection Against Mucosal Infection with SIVsm.
January 11, 1999... According to the authors' abstract of an article published in AIDS, "OBJECTIVE: To investigate whether vaccination of macaques with attenuated simian immunodeficiency virus (SIV)macC8 could induce long-term protective immunity against rectal...

Safety and Immunogenicity of a Combined Diphtheria-Tetanus-Acellular Pertussis-Inactivated Polio Vaccine-Haemophilus influenzae Type b Vaccine Administered at 2-4-6-13 or 3-5-12 Months of Age.
January 11, 1999... According to the authors' abstract of an article published in Pediatric Infectious Disease Journal, "METHODS: In an open randomized study we compared the safety and immunogenicity of two schedules for priming and booster vaccinations of...

Response to Conjugate Haemophilus influenzae B Vaccine Among Infants in Niamey, Niger.
January 11, 1999... According to the authors' abstract of an article published in American Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene, "Despite near elimination of Haemophilus influenzae b (Hib) meningitis from several industrialized countries following introduction...

Measles Outbreak in Juneau, Alaska, 1996: Implications for Future Outbreak Control Strategies.
January 11, 1999... According to the authors' abstract of an article published in Pediatrics, "OBJECTIVE: To determine the most effective outbreak control strategy for school-based measles outbreaks as the proportion of children with two doses of...

Prevention of Rotavirus Disease: Guidelines for Use of Rotavirus Vaccine.
January 11, 1999... According to the authors' abstract of an article published in Pediatrics, "Virtually all children experience rotavirus (Rv) infection before school entry. In the United States and other temperate countries, Rv disease peaks in the winter and...

Cat Model: Are Antibodies Irrelevant?
January 18, 1999... Do antibodies protect against AIDS? If so, it's hard to see how. Prototype AIDS vaccines can protect cats against feline immunodeficiency virus (FIV). The animals have a robust antibody response to vaccination. But extensive analysis by...

Expanded Autologous CTL: Working, But In Need of Help.
January 18, 1999... They work but they need help. There is a dramatic increase in HIV infected CD4(+) T cells in patients with their own culture-enhanced HIV specific CD8(+) cytotoxic T-lymphocytes (CTLs). This finding underscores the importance of CTLs for...

Costimulation Mechanism Found.
January 18, 1999... T-cells take an active role in costimulation by bending toward antigen-presenting cells (APCs). Activation of T cells is an essential event in immune response to antigen. This occurs when professional APCs present antigen via their major...

School-Based Hepatitis B Vaccination is Cost Effective.
January 18, 1999... Hepatitis B virus vaccination within public schools is feasible and can be delivered at costs similar to neonatal vaccinations, according to a report from British Columbia. Researchers from the University of Toronto found that the vaccine...

Women in India with HIV Forgo Costly AIDS Treatment.
January 18, 1999... Both husband and wife have HIV, but only one of them can afford the fistful of daily drugs that is the best treatment for the fatal disease. The wife, who refused to be named for fear of being ostracized by her neighbors because she carries...

Tracking Program Boosts Rate of Child Immunization 20 Percent.
January 18, 1999... Simply by tracking children's immunizations and calling on those families whose children fall behind on their shots, doctors can dramatically increase the number of children who are vaccinated as well as increase the likelihood of those...

Wisconsin Company Helps Develop Potatoes For Vaccine Experiment.
January 18, 1999... A privately-held Wisconsin company is working with a British biotechnology firm to grow potatoes that may replace the need for needles to administer vaccines. American Ag-Tech International Ltd. of Delavan was hired to grow potatoes...

Clinical and Epidemiological Characteristics of Viral Hepatitis A in Nursery Schools.
January 18, 1999... According to an abstract submitted by the authors to the Falk Symposium, Diseases of the Liver and the Bile Ducts - New Aspects and Clinical Implications, held September 12-13, 1998, in Prague, Czech Republic, "The burst of viral hepatitis A...

Douching Practices among US Women at High Risk of HIV Infection, Vaccine Preparedness Study of HIVNET.
January 18, 1999... According to an abstract submitted by the authors to the 12th World AIDS Conference, held June 28 - July 3, 1998, in Geneva, Switzerland, "OBJECTIVE: Changes in vaginal flora as a result of douching may increase the risk of HIV infection among...

Estimation of Vaccine Efficacy for Prophylactic HIV Vaccines from Field Trials in Developing Countries.
January 18, 1999... According to an abstract submitted by the authors to the 12th World AIDS Conference, held June 28 - July 3, 1998, in Geneva, Switzerland, "BACKGROUND: Prophylactic HIV vaccines could reduce susceptibility to infection or disease, i.e., vaccine...

Potent Neutralization of Primary HIV-1 Isolates by Antisera Induced Upon Immunization with a Recombinant Protein Expressing the Native V1/V2 Domain of gp120.
January 18, 1999... According to an abstract submitted by the authors to the 12th World AIDS Conference, held June 28 - July 3, 1998, in Geneva, Switzerland, "OBJECTIVES: Whereas it is known that some human immune sera possess potent neutralizing activities for...

Intranasal Immunization with a Plant Virus Expressing a Peptide from HIV-1 gp41 Stimulates Better Mucosal and Systemic HIV-1-specific IgA and IgG than Oral Immunization.
January 18, 1999... According to the authors' abstract of an article published in Journal of Immunological Methods, "Control of pandemic human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1) infection ideally requires specific mucosal immunity to protect the genital regions...

Specific-Antibody-Secreting Cells in the Rectums and Genital Tracts of Nonhuman Primates Following Vaccination.
January 18, 1999... According to the authors' abstract of an article published in Infection and Immunity, "To determine optimal strategies to induce specific-antibody-secreting cells (specific ASC) in the rectal and vaginal mucosae, we immunized monkeys with a...

Is Zero Dose Oral Polio Vaccine Effective in Preterm Babies?
January 18, 1999... According to the authors' abstract of an article published in Annals of Tropical Paediatrics, "A randomized, controlled trial was done to compare seroconversion following a single dose of trivalent oral polio vaccine (TOPV) in preterm babies,...

In vitro-Synthesized Infectious RNA as an Attenuated Live Vaccine in a Flavivirus Model.
January 18, 1999... According to the authors' abstract of an article published in Nature Medicine, "Live virus vaccines have in many cases proven to be an extremely effective tool for the prevention of viral diseases. However, the production of conventional live...

Gene-Gun Immunization of Vagina Induces Sustained Response.
January 25, 1999... Locally administered DNA immunization can induce immunity in the female genital tract, rat studies show. The finding may lead to new vaccines for sexually transmitted diseases and for contraception. Harvard and University of...

Antibodies To Hidden Antigen Neutralize All HIV Strains.
January 25, 1999... A long-shot experiment has led to what may be the most important finding in AIDS vaccine research. Like a movie vampire, HIV exposes its fangs only when it is just about to bite into a victim cell. What if you killed the virus at this...

Flu Vaccine Best In HIV+ Patients With CD4 Counts >200.
January 25, 1999... HIV infected patients are more likely to benefit from influenza immunization when their CD4 T-cell counts are >=200 cells/(micro)L. Yearly flu vaccinations are widely recommended for people with HIV infection. The vaccinations are...

Alaska Measles Outbreak Shows Need For 2 Vaccine Doses.
January 25, 1999... A measles outbreak swept through an Alaska high school despite near-total vaccine coverage, according to a report by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Half the school's students had received only one dose of...

Pilot Program Reduces Infections in Southern Italy.
January 25, 1999... A pilot vaccination program appears to be responsible for a substantial reduction of hepatitis B virus infections in an endemic part of southern Italy. In 1983, a pilot project of universal hepatitis B vaccination was introduced in a...

Bacteria Becoming Increasingly Resistant To Antibiotics.
January 25, 1999... Streptococcus pneumoniae, a bacterium that can cause life-threatening infections in adults and especially children, is rapidly becoming resistant to penicillin and cephalosporins such as ceftriaxone, the most widely used antibiotics currently...

Sequencing of HIV from India Waves A Red Flag for Vaccine Developers.
January 25, 1999... Scientists at Johns Hopkins, Baltimore, Maryland, and in India reported they have sequenced the complete genome of a form of HIV from that country for the first time. The work has revealed unexpected variation in genes for one key part of...

Findings Support Vaccine Approach.
January 25, 1999... Cel-Sci Corporation, Vienna, Virginia, has received numerous inquiries regarding a recent report by Johns Hopkins University investigators in Baltimore, Maryland, describing findings of a key part of HIV in India (see accompanying story). ...

Global Collaboration Entered on FluMist Vaccine.
January 25, 1999... Wyeth Lederle Vaccines, St. Davids, Pennsylvania, and Aviron, Mountain View, California, announced a worldwide collaboration for the marketing of FluMist - Aviron's investigational intranasal influenza vaccine. FluMist is under development...

H. pylori Genomic Comparisons Announced.
January 25, 1999... Genome Therapeutics Corp., Waltham, Massachusetts, and Astra AB announced the first ever comparison of two complete genomic sequences of a single bacterium, Helicobacter pylori, a common pathogen shown to cause a variety of conditions including...

First Lyme Disease Vaccine Available.
January 25, 1999... The world's first Lyme disease vaccine was made available to doctors, its manufacturer announced. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in December 1998 approved SmithKline Beecham's LYMErix for vaccination of people ages 15 to 70....

Patented Subunit Vaccine May Prevent Both Chickenpox and Shingles.
January 25, 1999... A recently patented technology may provide a safer and more versatile vaccine against the virus that causes millions of chickenpox and shingles cases each year in the United States. The U.S. patent issued recently to Research Corporation...

DNA Vaccines.
January 25, 1999... "Studies on the DNA Vaccine (pCD-Sj32) and Its Efficacy of Protective Immunity." Y.E. Shi, L.P. Xie, C.M. Li and J.J. Han. Department of Parasitology, Tongii Medical University, Wuhan, China; Department of Immunology, University of Alabama,...

HBV Vaccines (Reactions).
January 25, 1999... "Importance of Attributable Risk in the Monitoring of Adverse Reaction to Vaccines: The Case of Hepatitis B Vaccine in 8-10 Year-Old Children." G. De Serres, B. Duval, N. Boulianne, M. Rochette, L. Rocherte, L. Ross, M. Dionne and M....

Immunology (Vaccines).
January 25, 1999... "Influence of Pneumococcal Vaccination on HIV Antigenemia in HIV(+) Patients on Combined Antiretroviral Therapy." Ph. Henrivaux and Y. Fairon. Les Cliniques St. Joseph and Private Contribution, Liage, Belgium. According to an abstract...

Vaccine Trial (HBV).
January 25, 1999... "A Randomized Trial of Half Versus Full Dose of Two Recombinant Hepatitis B Vaccines." A.K. McCarthy, R. Chaudary, J. Simard, L. McAvoy and M.L. Tepper. Canada. According to an abstract submitted by the authors to the 3rd Canadian...

Cancer Vaccines.
January 25, 1999... Rodolfo, M.; Melani, C.; Zilocchi, C.; Cappetti, B.; Luison, E.; Arioli, I.; Parenza, M.; Canevari, S.; Colombo, M.P. "IgG2a Induced by Interleukin (IL) 12-producing Tumor Cell Vaccines But Not IgG1 Induced by IL-4 Vaccine Is Associated with...

DNA Vaccines.
January 25, 1999... Maecker, H.T.; Umetsu, D.T.; Dekruyff, R.H.; Levy, S. "Cytotoxic T-Cell Responses to DNA Vaccination: Dependence on Antigen Presentation Via Class II MHC." Journal of Immunology, December 15, 1998;161(12):6532-6536. According to the...

DNA Vaccines.
January 25, 1999... Cohen, A.D.; Boyer, J.D.; Weiner, D.B. "Modulating the Immune Response to Genetic Immunization." FASEB Journal, December 1998;12(15):1611-1626. According to the authors' abstract of an article published in FASEB Journal, "Genetic...

Epithelial Tumors.
January 25, 1999... Peoples, G.E.; Anderson, B.W.; Fisk, B.; Kudelka, A.P.; Wharton, J.T.; Ioannides, C.G. "Ovarian Cancer-Associated Lymphocyte Recognition of Folate Binding Protein Peptides." Annals of Surgical Oncology, December 1998;5(8):743-750. ...

HIV Immunology.
January 25, 1999... Talesnik, E.; Vial, P.A.; Labarca, J.; Mendez, C.; Soza, X. "Time Course of Antibody Response to Tetanus Toxoid and Pneumococcal Capsular Polysaccharides in Patients Infected with HIV." Journal of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndromes and Human...

Maternal Antibodies.
January 25, 1999... Siegrist, C.A.; Barrios, C.; Martinez, X.; Brandt, C.; Berney, M.; Cordova, M.; Kovarik, J.; Lambert, P.H. "Influence of Maternal Antibodies on Vaccine Responses: Inhibition of Antibody But Not T-Cell Responses Allows Successful Early...

Meningococcal Disease Fijen, C.A.P.; Kuijper, E.J.; Drogariapiranthitou, M.; Vanleeuwen, Y.; Daha, M.R.; Dankert, J. "Protection Against Meningococcal Serogroup ACYW Disease in Complement-Deficient Individuals Vaccinated with the Tetravalent Meningococcal Capsular Polysaccharide Vaccine." Clinical and Experimental Immunology, December 1998;114(3):362-369.
January 25, 1999... According to the authors' abstract of an article published in Clinical and Experimental Immunology, "Individuals with properdin, C3, or late complement component deficiency (LCCD) frequently develop meningococcal disease. Vaccination of these...

Immunogenicity of Pneumococcal Vaccine in Persons with Spinal Cord Injury.
January 25, 1999... According to the authors' abstract of an article published in Archives of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, "OBJECTIVE: To determine immunogenicity and optimum timing for administering the 23-valent pneumococcal vaccine after spinal cord...

Vaccine Development Anthony, L.S.D.; Wu, H.C.; Sweet, H.; Turnnir, C.; Boux, L.J.; Mizzen, L.A. "Priming of CD8(+) CTL Effector Cells in Mice by Immunization with a Stress Protein Influenza Virus Nucleoprotein Fusion Molecule." Vaccine, January 28, 1999;17(4):373-383.
January 25, 1999... According to the authors' abstract of an article published in Vaccine, "Literature is accumulating which suggests the potential for stress proteins to form the basis of a novel vaccine technology. Immunization with mammalian tumor-derived...

Vaccine Development (Prostate Cancer) Kuduk, S.D.; Schwarz, J.B.; Chen, X.T.; Glunz, P.W.; Sames, D.; Ragupathi, G.; Livingston, P.O.; Danishefsky, S.J. "Synthetic and Immunological Studies on Clustered Modes of Mucin-Related Tn and TF O-linked Antigens: The Preparation of a Glycopeptide-based Vaccine for Clinical Trials Sgainst Prostate Cancer." Journal of the American Chemical Society, December 9, 1998;120(48):12474-12485.
January 25, 1999... According to the authors' abstract of an article published in Journal of the American Chemical Society, "The syntheses of two tumor-associated carbohydrate antigens, Tn and TF, have been achieved using glycal assembly and cassette...