Bug versus Bug: Insect virus makes a viable flu vaccine
By Brian Vastag
A new influenza vaccine churned out by caterpillar cells prevents the flu, researchers say. The advance might eventually revolutionize the manufacture of flu vaccine, now produced in chicken eggs in a long, cumbersome process prone to contamination and other failures.
After successful safety tests, “this is the first time this … vaccine has been shown to protect people against the flu,” says John J. Treanor of the University of Rochester (N.Y.) Medical Center, who led the study reported in the April 11 Journal of the American Medical Association.