Race for a zika vaccine begins in earnest
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E-mail Xinhua, February 3, 2016
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| Scientists will work together on creating a vaccine. [File photo] |
![Scientists will work together on creating a vaccine. [File photo]](http://images.china.cn/attachement/jpg/site1007/20160203/b8aeed990456181c18dc48.jpg "Scientists will work together on creating a vaccine. [File photo]")
The number of cases in Brazil of newborns with unusally small heads linked to the zika virus has reached 4,783 by Tuesday, with 404 new ones in the past week. So far 1.5 million Brazilians have been affected by the virus as people crave for a vaccine to stop its spread.
Last week, Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff and U.S. President Barack Obama agreed to create a bilateral commission to work on a vaccine.
The two presidents said scientists from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in Maryland and the Instituto Butantan in Sao Paulo will work together on creating a vaccine.
Brazilian scientists have spent several years developing a vaccine for dengue, a disease also transmitted by the Aedes aegypti mosquito, an experience that could be a great help in producing a zika vaccine as early as possible, said Jorge Kalil, director of the Instituto Butantan.
However, it's a long way to go before a vaccine becomes available.
On Monday, Brazil's chief of staff, Jacques Wagner, explained that "while we are about to start joint investigation efforts with the U.S., scientists estimate that the time needed until a vaccine could be between three and five years."
Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the American National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), which is part of the NIH, gave some details about why creating a zika vaccine will be complicated.
"Prior to this time, we have not spent anything on zika," he told a press conference last Monday, adding that even diagnosis currently takes two weeks within a lab.
However, Fauci added that the NIAID has spent around 100 million U.S. dollars to research flaviviruses, a category into which zika falls, leading to a successful clinical trial for a West Nile virus in 2011.
According to Fauci, the NIAID will now try to substitute the West Nile virus gene for the zika virus gene. If this pays off, the timeline for a zika vaccine could be significantly shortened.
Medical companies also joined in the research into the vaccine. On Tuesday, French drug giant Sanofi announced it has begun its own research into a zika vaccine.
At a press conference, it was announced that Dr. Nicholas Jackson would lead Sanofi's in-roads into zika, with the expert adding that the company would use its experience researching dengue, yellow fever and Japanese encephalitis.
Last year, Sanofi was responsible for producing the first vaccine against dengue, which is now used Brazil.
However, Sanofi said it had already been in touch with the World Health Organization and the Brazilian government to ensure that all the different avenues leading to a zika vaccine would be explored collaboratively.
Although Brazilian authorities have said that a number of originally diagnosed cases of microcephaly had no link to zika, worry continues to spread.
On Tuesday, the U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) confirmed the first case of zika contracted in the U.S., adding that it had been sexually transmitted.
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