Fluzone Quadrivalent Influenza Vaccine Approved by FDA for Elderly
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved a supplemental Biologics License Application (BLA) for the Fluzone high-dose quadrivalent influenza vaccine for use by adults 65 years of age and older. Fluzone is manufactured by Sanofi Pasteur, Inc. of France.1 2 The Fluzone high-dose influenza vaccine was approved by the FDA in 2009 as […]
Quest for Universal Flu Vaccine Boosted by $200M NIH Grant to University of Maryland
Story Highlights National Institutes of Health (NIH) has awarded the University of Maryland a contract for more than $200 million to develop a universal influenza vaccine. Currently, the influenza vaccine used around the world is developed every year by drug companies based on the “best guesses” made by public health officials at the World Health […]
NIH and Johnson & Johnson to Begin HIV Vaccine Trials on Humans
Story Highlights NIH, in collaboration with Johnson & Johnson, will begin HIV vaccine efficacy trials on humans in August 2019 in the U.S. Another HIV vaccine candidate, using a live attenuated herpes cytomegalovirus (CMV), is also nearing clinical trials in humans. There are serious safety concerns regarding live attenuated vaccines and numerous cases reported in […]
Artificial Intelligence Takes Over Vaccine Development
Story Highlights A computer with artificial intelligence (AI) has designed a new “turbocharged” flu vaccine without human help. A research team from Flinders University in Australia created the AI program, which they named SAM (Search Algorithm for Ligands). The AI vaccine research work is being funded by the U.S. National Institutes of Health. Scientists in […]
America’s ‘Good Medicine’ Mindset
The idea that you can give someone a disease, or something worse than that disease, by giving them a medicine designed to cure that disease or prevent the patient from contracting it and spreading it to others is so counter-intuitive, so unethical, so downright insane that it is unthinkable, unconscionable, unbelievable. After all, isn’t the first principle of medicine to “first, do no harm”? And yet… I think one of the greatest songs of all time is the one by…