Tuberculosis is fighting back against current drugs. The first new TB vaccine for 80 years is being tested in clinical trials in South Africa. Oxford University researchers say that the jab, given alongside the current BCG vaccine, could protect people better from the disease, BBC reported.
TB kills more than two million people world-wide a year, and drug resistant forms are becoming more common. The Health Protection Agency recorded more than 8,500 cases in 2005, but the BCG vaccine, which used to be given to all schoolchildren, is currently targeted only at communities with high rates of the infection, such as immigrant groups and the homeless.
The new vaccine has already passed safety trials in the Gambia and the latest tests in the Western Cape area of South Africa, where one in 100 infants has the illness, will reveal if the extra jab works better than BCG alone.
This vaccine is safe, and stimulates very high levels of the type of immune response, "It is important for them to test whether or not this vaccine does work to stop people getting TB.
The results of the Gambian trials suggest that the vaccine is having a big impact on how the body's immune system is primed to resist TB infection. It works by stimulating immune system cells called T-cells to produce a stronger response to the BCG jab.
A spokesman said: "The TB bacterium has for too long managed to stay a step ahead of human efforts, as shown by the appearance, especially in HIV positive populations in southern Africa, of a strain of tuberculosis resistant to virtually all known drugs." If the vaccine proved to be safe, cheap and far more effective than BCG, with its effects lasting throughout life, then the reintroduction of universal immunisation "might be worthwhile".
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