Researchers hope a new treatment developed in the United Kingdom will prove vital in controlling future flu pandemics such as H1N1 (swine) flu, bird flu as well as ending the need for annual flu jabs.
Developed by scientists at Oxford University, the new vaccine works by targeting protein cells inside the influenza A virus, instead of current vaccines that attack proteins on the outside of the flu virus.
According to Sarah Gilbert, head of the project at Oxford’s Jenner Institute, this method is effective because proteins inside the virus are far more similar across all the influenza strains and are less likely to mutate.
In the first successful trial on humans, 11 healthy people were vaccinated and infected with the seasonal flu strain along with 11 non-vaccinated volunteers.
The results, say Gilbert, are important in developing a new form of protection that researchers hope could spell the end of flu vaccination supply problems.
The most recent global pandemic was the 2009 H1N1 flu pandemic, in which the estimates of deaths ranged as high as 12,500 in the U.S. alone, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Susannah Palk for CNN
