Preventing the Next Pandemic, A vaccine to prevent it may finally be possible

[G_j]

https://www.scientificamerican.com/custom-media/preventing-the-next-pandemic/?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=sacm_sabin&utm_content=link-post&fbclid=IwAR0x1HJE7oh9oZ4J8KrPSxiVusF0jA16OE7nmlrZhTET4m560Pl8DbSAjzo_aem_ASvTOU74NtwJDmfZNEnGlGg8v02p4DCkAdaHWqNTYXK-TGnZHGH9lkgsGLBMWizay5IIQ17EsquCYKgCnl7vUXxOpoFkqAIEdbMbZgPBE2GgbUVVk-xzNf7gp7V6Wh925OI

Preventing the Next Pandemic

An influenza pandemic like that of 1918 could make the scourge of COVID-19 look mild. A vaccine to prevent it may finally be possible.

This article was produced for Sabin Vaccine Institute by Scientific American Custom Media, a division separate from the magazine's board of editors.

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Between 1918 and 1920, the ‘Spanish flu’ infected a third of the world’s population, and caused an astronomical 17 million deaths. A century later, we have yet to develop defenses against an equally devastating influenza pandemic, says Stacey Knobler, senior director at the Sabin Vaccine Institute.

Annual flu vaccines offer only partial protection against circulating strains that cause seasonal flu. Even in a good year, the vaccine reduces the risk of infection only 50-60 percent, and in a bad year, that number has dwindled to 20 percent. And the annual vaccines offer almost no protection from a novel influenza strain that could cause a pandemic.

“Continuing to rely on vaccines that respond to circulating strains from year to year is clearly not going to get us the protection we need,” Knobler says.
What’s needed instead are universal influenza vaccines (UIV) — vaccines that offer broad and long-lasting protection from both seasonal and pandemic flu. Now, thanks to advances in fields from basic immunology to vaccine design, universal influenza vaccines may finally be on the horizon.

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[MFM008]

1. May have been

More than 17 million....a lot more.