A DNA Zika vaccine developed by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) has entered a clinical trial to evaluate its safety and efficacy.
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The vaccine will be given to 80 volunteers those ages 18 to 35 by the end of August at three study sites in Bethesda, Maryland, Baltimore and Atlanta, as part of the trial.
Researchers first started researching a vaccine shortly after the initial outbreak in Brazil, in May of previous year.
USA officials said they don’t expect to see a Zika epidemic in the United States similar to those in Latin America. It is now spreading in 50 countries and territories, mainly in Latin America, the Caribbean and Florida. These are believed to be the first mosquito-transmitted cases in the mainland United States. Although Zika infections are usually asymptomatic, some people experience mild illness lasting about a week. The monkeys were administered with a dose of the Zika virus after a month, the researchers noted that none of the monkeys showed any symptoms of the infection.
Three vaccines provided complete protection against Zika virus in non-human primates. Researchers said that if the virus is contracted during pregnancy, Zika can cause severe birth defects.
While it will still take some time before the new drug becomes available commercially, Fauci said the launch of the clinical testing on humans is a crucial step forward for its development. It will take a month before the projected schedule for vaccine development. That vaccine candidate was found to be safe and induced an immune response when tested in a Phase 1 clinical trial. The first of them used a purified and inactivated version of the virus, which was too disabled to cause an infection but still caused the monkeys’ immune systems to make antibodies capable of fighting Zika. The bit of genetic material isn’t infectious; after injection, the genes prompt the body into an immune response that ultimately creates antibodies against the virus.
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Rhesus monkeys vaccinated with it “showed complete protection against both Brazilian and Puerto Rican strains of Zika”, said the study. The volunteers will be divided into three groups that will get the same dose at various intervals during 20 weeks. The vaccine will be given with a needle-free “jet injector”, which uses a high-pressure stream of fluid to inject the vaccine into the muscle. After 8 or 12 weeks of initial vaccine administration, participants in the first two groups will receive a second vaccine shot. After the vaccination, the participants will remain in the clinic and will be observed by researchers 30 minutes. And public health officials seem confident that they will be able to keep majority there.
