Vaccine Market
A new push by the CDC will help get half of the country's 11 to 18-year olds inoculated with a meningococcal meningitis vaccine, but health officials remain concerned that millions of children will remain unprotected from a virus that can kill or leave victims brain damaged. Report
UK officials say that extending the country's annual campaign for flu vaccinations to children could greatly reduce the infection rate in the entire population. Story
The UK wants to provide catch-up inoculations against the measles in an effort to avoid an epidemic. Story
Ireland is rolling out a campaign to provide all 12-year-old girls in the country with a vaccination against cervical cancer. But health officials have ruled out a one-time effort to vaccinate all 13- to 15-year-old girls. Report
Vaccine Research
Researchers say that a failed HIV drug--AMD3100--may prove effective against West Nile disease. In a study involving mice, half of the rodents in the treated arm improved in eight days while all of the mice in the control arm sickened and died. Report
Bacteria, not flu viruses, were responsible for the bulk of the deaths recorded in the great 1918 epidemic. And that is one reason why health officials should prepare to have large stockpiles of antibiotics in the event of any future pandemics. Story
Researchers from the Virginia Bioinformatics Institute at Virginia Tech have identified the region of a large family of virulence proteins in oomycete plant pathogens that enables the proteins to enter the cells of their hosts. Release