China develops new human bird flu vaccine virus
7/1/2007 11:15
A new recombinant H5N1 vaccine virus has been developed in China and is
available for researchers and companies that want to develop or produce the H5N1
vaccine for human use, an official with the Chinese Center for Disease Control
and Prevention (CDC) said.
Shu Yuelong, senior official with Chinese CDC,
said the new vaccine virus was developed by the Chinese CDC and US CDC from the
cases of human infections of the deadly virus in southern China.
Researchers
found that a newly isolated virus collected from people infected with H5N1 in
southern China was distinguishable in terms of antigen from the viruses that had
previously been selected for vaccine development, Shu said.
Shu said it was
the first time for China to develop a new human H5N1 vaccine virus, which will
be a great contribution to the prevention of the fatal epidemic.
The World
Health Organization (WHO) has put the new development on its Web site and said
it's available for "institutions, companies and others interested in pandemic
vaccine development."
The cases of human infection with bird flu in China
numbered 13 in 2006, and seven in 2005.
In August 2006, the WHO found that
there was antigenic variation among the recent H5N1 viruses. Since then, the WHO
Collaborating Centers and H5 Reference Laboratories have been developing several
new recombinant H5N1 vaccine viruses.
Xinhua
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