Vaccine News and Research

Latest Vaccine News and Research

MSF publishes list of top 10 stories of 2011 about access to medicine

This Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) special report highlights the top 10 stories of 2011 regarding access to essential medicines, according to MSF.

23 Dec 2011

Religious leaders should come together to ensure access to NTD medicines for world's poorest

Most of the world's neglected tropical diseases occur among populations that adhere to Islam, Catholicism, or Hinduism, an observation that "affords an opportunity to establish a unique interfaith dialogue among religious leaders" leading to global action, Peter Hotez, president of the Sabin Vaccine Institute, and Serap Aksoy, a professor at the Yale School of Public Health, write in a PLoS Neglected Tropical Diseases (NTD) editorial.

23 Dec 2011

HPV vaccine support by GAVI example of 'equity in health'

Noting that human papillomavirus (HPV) causes 70 percent of cervical cancer cases worldwide, Mary Robinson, former president of Ireland and former GAVI Alliance Board chair, writes in this BMJ Group Blogs post that the GAVI Alliance's decision to support the introduction of HPV vaccine among women in developing countries "is an important example of how we must continue to strive for equity in health. And it will help ensure that the world's less-privileged women remain the strength behind their children, their families, and their communities."

22 Dec 2011

Viewpoints: HHS punts on essential benefits; A doctor's view of Medicare

The health care reform law passed last year requires insurers to offer, at a minimum, a set of "essential" benefits to individuals and small groups. ... On Friday, however, the Department of Health and Human Services put out a bulletin proposing to let each state come up with its own definition.

22 Dec 2011

Researchers evaluate Clade C HIV envelope protein in Phase I trial

In the first clinical trial of an injectable vaccine containing trimeric HIV envelope protein (gp140) relevant to the predominant strain of HIV in Africa, researchers from four UK academic centers (St George's University London, Imperial College, Hull York Medical School (HYMS; University of York) and the Medical Research Council Clinical Trial Unit) and from the Infectious Disease Research Institute (IDRI) have come together to evaluate whether the vaccine is safe for use in human volunteers.

22 Dec 2011

Malaria vaccine shows early success

An experimental vaccine for malaria has been developed by British scientists. It has shown early potential to neutralize many, perhaps all, strains of the deadliest malaria parasite.

21 Dec 2011

University of Western Ontario receives FDA approval to begin SAV001 HIV trial

The first and only preventative HIV vaccine based on a genetically modified killed whole virus has received approval by the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to start human clinical trials.

21 Dec 2011

Vacc-4x nasal vaccine can effectively treat HIV

Thirty years after AIDS was first described, there is still no effective vaccine against the HIV virus. Worldwide, roughly 33 million people are HIV-positive. Researchers are working to find out whether a HIV vaccine developed by a Norwegian biotech company can be administered nasally.

21 Dec 2011

University of Oxford scientists develop new candidate malaria vaccine

A new candidate malaria vaccine with the potential to neutralise all strains of the most deadly species of malaria parasite has been developed by a team led by scientists at the University of Oxford.

21 Dec 2011

Pfizer, GlaxoSmithKline to increase sales of pneumococcal vaccines through GAVI

Pharmaceutical companies Pfizer and GlaxoSmithKline are increasing their sales of reduced-cost pneumonia vaccines to developing countries through the GAVI Alliance "by more than 50 percent, marking the scale-up of an international program to protect millions of children," Reuters reports.

20 Dec 2011

Gardasil – cervical cancer vaccine offered to all boys as well

Soon all adolescent boys may be vaccinated against the sexually transmitted disease that causes some forms of cancer under an extension of a scheme now available to girls, the Australian government's expert panel has recommended. The committee adds that the shots would also widen immunity to the virus, which would further reduce the risk to women and stem the spread of genital warts in both sexes.

19 Dec 2011

Bloomberg TV to air segment on Antigen Express' immunotherapeutic breast cancer vaccine

Generex Biotechnology Corporation today announced that Bloomberg Television is scheduled to air a segment on the immunotherapeutic breast cancer vaccine being developed by its wholly-owned subsidiary, Antigen Express, Inc.

19 Dec 2011

Delaware Court upholds original ruling in favor of PharmAthene

PharmAthene, Inc. today announced that the Delaware Court of Chancery has denied SIGA Technologies' motion for reargument filed on October 4, 2011, upholding the Court's original September 22, 2011 decision awarding PharmAthene 50% of the net profits over ten years from all sales of SIGA's smallpox antiviral therapeutic, ST-246, and related products, after SIGA receives the first $40 million in net profits.

19 Dec 2011

New gel could nip Lyme borreliosis infection in the bud

They come out in the spring, and each year they spread further - the ticks. Thirty percent of them transmit borrelia pathogens, the causative agent of Lyme borreliosis that can damage joints and organs.

19 Dec 2011

HPV test outshines Pap smears for detection of early cervical cancers

A new trial involving nearly 40,000 women in the Netherlands showed that testing for the human papillomavirus, or HPV allowed doctors to detect abnormal cervical cells earlier and prevent more cases of cervical cancer than administering pap smears alone.

18 Dec 2011

Pfizer enters Prevenar 13 supply agreement to protect children from pneumococcal disease

Pfizer Inc. today announced it has entered into a second supply agreement which will broaden and extend the duration of the Company's commitment to help protect millions of infants and young children in the developing world from pneumococcal disease - the leading cause of vaccine-preventable death in young children.

17 Dec 2011

Behavioral interventions reduce STIs and improve condom use

Behavioral interventions aimed at reducing sexual risk behaviors, such as unprotected sex, are effective at both promoting condom use and reducing sexually transmitted infections (STIs) long after the initial intervention, according to a new report in the December 15 issue of the Journal of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndromes.

16 Dec 2011

Soligenix secures Harvard option rights to initiate anthrax vaccine development program

Soligenix, Inc., a development stage biopharmaceutical company, announced today that it has initiated a next generation anthrax vaccine development program pursuant to a field-exclusive option agreement with Harvard University to negotiate a license under patent rights that cover prophylactic uses of a modified anthrax toxin protein.

16 Dec 2011

AP examines WHO target of reducing malaria deaths to near zero by 2015

The Associated Press/San Francisco Chronicle examines what it will take for the WHO to reach its new target of reducing malaria deaths to near zero by the end of 2015 and how "some experts questioned if WHO should be setting such lofty goals, especially at a time of declining funding."

16 Dec 2011

Wistar to develop new drug against EBV-associated cancers

The Wistar Institute today announced that it has signed a funding agreement with the Wellcome Trust, a United Kingdom-based charity, to support the development of a new drug to treat cancers associated with Epstein-Barr virus.

16 Dec 2011