A vaccine is a biological preparation that provides active acquired immunity to a particular infectious or malignant disease. The safety and effectiveness of vaccines has been widely studied and verified. A vaccine typically contains an agent that resembles a disease-causing microorganism and is often made from weakened or killed forms of the microbe, its toxins, or one of its surface proteins. The agent stimulates the body's immune system to recognize the agent as a threat, destroy it, and to further recognize and destroy any of the microorganisms associated with that agent that it may encounter in the future.
A DNA vaccine is a type of vaccine that transfects a specific antigen-coding DNA sequence into the cells of an organism as a mechanism to induce an immune response.
Immunization, or immunisation, is the process by which an individual's immune system becomes fortified against an infectious agent.
The Pasteur Institute is a French non-profit private foundation dedicated to the study of biology, micro-organisms, diseases, and vaccines. It is named after Louis Pasteur, who invented pasteurization and vaccines for anthrax and rabies. The institute was founded on 4 June 1887, and inaugurated on 14 November 1888.
Rabies virus, scientific name Rabies lyssavirus, is a neurotropic virus that causes rabies in humans and animals. Rabies transmission can occur through the saliva of animals and less commonly through contact with human saliva. Rabies lyssavirus, like many rhabdoviruses, has an extremely wide host range. In the wild it has been found infecting many mammalian species, while in the laboratory it has been found that birds can be infected, as well as cell cultures from mammals, birds, reptiles and insects. Rabies is reported in more than 150 countries on all continents, with the exclusion of Antarctica. The main burden of disease is reported in Asia and Africa, but some cases have been reported also in Europe in the past 10 years, especially in returning travellers.
Sanofi Pasteur is the vaccines division of the French multinational pharmaceutical company Sanofi. Sanofi Pasteur is the largest company in the world devoted entirely to vaccines. It is one of four global producers of the yellow fever vaccine.
Artificial induction of immunity is immunization achieved by human efforts in preventive healthcare, as opposed to natural immunity as produced by organisms' immune systems. It makes people immune to specific diseases by means other than waiting for them to catch the disease. The purpose is to reduce the risk of death and suffering, that is, the disease burden, even when eradication of the disease is not possible. Vaccination is the chief type of such immunization, greatly reducing the burden of vaccine-preventable diseases.
H5N1 clinical trials are clinical trials concerning H5N1 vaccines, which are intended to provide immunization to influenza A virus subtype H5N1. They are intended to discover pharmacological effects and identify any adverse reactions the vaccines may achieve in humans.
Antonio Lanzavecchia is an Italian and Swiss immunologist. As a fellow of Collegio Borromeo he obtained a degree with honors in Medicine in 1976 from the University of Pavia where he specialized in Pediatrics and Infectious Diseases. He is Head Human Immunology Program, Istituto Nazionale di Genetica Molecolare-INGM, Milan and SVP Senior research Fellow, Humabs/Vir Biotechnology, Bellinzona and San Francisco (USA). Since 2017, he is also Professor at the Faculty of Biomedical Sciences of the Università della Svizzera italiana (USI).
The rabies vaccine is a vaccine used to prevent rabies. There are a number of rabies vaccines available that are both safe and effective. They can be used to prevent rabies before, and, for a period of time, after exposure to the rabies virus, which is commonly caused by a dog bite or a bat bite.
The Vaccine Research Center (VRC), is an intramural division of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). The mission of the VRC is to discover and develop both vaccines and antibody-based products that target infectious diseases.
An inactivated vaccine is a vaccine consisting of virus particles, bacteria, or other pathogens that have been grown in culture and then killed to destroy disease-producing capacity. In contrast, live vaccines use pathogens that are still alive. Pathogens for inactivated vaccines are grown under controlled conditions and are killed as a means to reduce infectivity and thus prevent infection from the vaccine.
A neutralizing antibody (NAb) is an antibody that defends a cell from a pathogen or infectious particle by neutralizing any effect it has biologically. Neutralization renders the particle no longer infectious or pathogenic. Neutralizing antibodies are part of the humoral response of the adaptive immune system against viruses, intracellular bacteria and microbial toxin. By binding specifically to surface structures (antigen) on an infectious particle, neutralizing antibodies prevent the particle from interacting with its host cells it might infect and destroy.
SAV001-H is the first candidate preventive HIV vaccine using a killed or "dead" version of the HIV-1 virus.
Universal Immunisation Programme (UIP) is a vaccination programme launched by the Government of India in 1985. It became a part of Child Survival and Safe Motherhood Programme in 1992 and is currently one of the key areas under National Rural Health Mission since 2005. The programme now consists of vaccination for 12 diseases- tuberculosis, diphtheria, pertussis, tetanus, poliomyelitis, measles, hepatitis B, diarrhoea, Japanese encephalitis, rubella, pneumonia and Pneumococcal diseases. Hepatitis B and Pneumococcal diseases were added to the UIP in 2007 and 2017 respectively. The cost of all the vaccines are borne by the state and the government spent ₹3,587 crore (US$450 million) in 2017 to purchase the vaccines to provide them for free.
A H5N1 vaccine is an influenza vaccine intended to provide immunization to influenza A virus subtype H5N1.
Cell-based vaccines are developed from mammalian or more rarely avian or insect cell lines rather than the more common method which uses the cells in embryonic chicken eggs to develop the antigens. The potential use of cell culture techniques in developing viral vaccines has been widely investigated in the 2000s as a complementary and alternative platform to the current egg-based strategies.
Natteri Veeraraghavan (1913-2004) was an Indian physician, microbiologist and medical researcher, known for his contributions to the understanding of diseases like rabies, tuberculosis and leprosy. He was a former director of the Pasteur Institute of India, Coonoor and the chairman of the World Health Organization International Reference Center on Rabies. He was honoured by the Government of India in 1967, with the award of Padma Shri, the fourth highest Indian civilian award for his contributions to the society.
Intrastructural help (ISH) is where T and B cells cooperate to help or suppress an immune response gene. ISH has proven effective for the treatment of influenza, rabies related lyssavirus, hepatitis B, and the HIV virus. This process was used in 1979 to observe that T cells specific to the influenza virus could promote the stimulation of hemagglutinin specific B cells and elicit an effective humoral immune response. It was later applied to the lyssavirus and was shown to protect raccoons from lethal challenge. The ISH principle is especially beneficial because relatively invariable structural antigens can be used for the priming of T-cells to induce humoral immune response against variable surface antigens. Thus, the approach has also transferred well for the treatment of hepatitis B and HIV.
Vaccination in India includes the use of vaccines in Indian public health and the place of vaccines in Indian society, policy, and research.
