DrConnected

Rotavirus, a severe diarrhoeal disease which is responsible for approximately half a million child deaths a year, may soon be a lot easier to control due to a new discovery. A team from the Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine at Tufts University and Tufts University School of Medicine worked with their counterparts from Boston and Tulane Universities on a study which has had amazing results.

The study, published in this month’s issue of Clinical and Vaccine Immunology, shows a vaccine which is delivered nasally and has been proven to combat the spread of rotavirus in mice. Testing has shown that this new method can safely be used for tetanus and is currently being tested with other immunisations such as diphteria. Without the need for refrigeration that current vaccines have, this new method would greatly reduce the cost involved in immunising people in developing countries. Availability in the form of nasal drops makes it more easily transportable and negates the need for a sterile environment. It also makes the lack of trained personnel less of a problem.

“In addition to being heat-stable and low-cost, the B. subtilis vaccines are given in the form of nasal drops or spray. A needle-free approach to vaccination is particularly advantageous in developing countries where clean needles and syringes and trained personnel are not always available,” said team leader Abraham L. (Linc) Sonenshein, PhD, professor and acting chair of molecular biology and microbiology at TUSM.

“This vaccine project is still in the developmental stage,” he continued. “The next major step for these vaccines is to show that they are safe and work well in humans, and then to extend the rotavirus and tetanus vaccine technology to include diphtheria, pertussis and other infectious diseases. Those diseases cause tens of thousands of deaths, particularly in newborns and in South-East Asia. We are actively looking for partners in the US and around the world to help us pursue our goal of reaching the point where many childhood and adult vaccines can be manufactured in a way that avoids the need for injection or refrigeration. Jerry Keusch of Boston University School of Public Health and I started this project 15 years ago and it has taken a long time to reach the stage where we now have effective needle-free vaccines. The technology has now advanced enough that we can expect to be successful with many other vaccines in a short time frame.”