Researchers are one step closer to creating a jab that does not have to be reformulated every year and also protects against pandemic strains. Achieving this would be a major breakthrough.
A major advance towards a universal flu vaccine, which could protect not just against seasonal flu but also future pandemic strains of the occasionally lethal virus, has been revealed in a new study published in the journal Nature Medicine.
By targeting a different part of the viral protein than conventional seasonal flu virus attack, researchers created a broad-based vaccine that was given to 20 US volunteers. It was a small study but appeared to work.
“Vaccination was found to be safe and induced a broad, strong, durable and functional immune response,” the authors reported. “The results suggest that [the methods] have the potential to be developed as universal vaccines that protect broadly against influenza viruses.”
The search for a universal flu vaccine has long been a goal of science. Success would mean that regular seasonal jabs could be substituted for a single shot. It would also greatly mitigate the threat of future pandemics - many of which are caused by influenza viruses.
Florian Krammer, Professor at the Department of Microbiology Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York and one of the study’s authors, described the work as “a first step towards the clinical development of universal influenza virus vaccines”.