Vaccine on way for all strains of meningitis
Researchers have developed an inactive form of the meningococcus bacterium that triggers an immune response against all strains of meningitis in mice.
They demonstrated that the bacterial gene component phoP is involved
in regulation of virulence, and engineered a phoP mutant which they showed
to be avirulent in mice. The mice infected with the inactive strain of
meningitis C developed an immune response that destroyed the infecting
strain and also showed cross-reactive bactericidal activity against strains
of groups A and B, by binding to the surface of the meningococcus.
This type of cross-reactive protection is seen following meningococcal
disease, say the researchers, and identification of the proteins that
regulate this response could lead to development of a full meningococcal
vaccine for humans. In addition to being used to identify cross-reactive
protective antigens in the meningococcus, the phoP mutant is itself a
potential live attenuated vaccine, they add (Infection and Immunity 2004;72:
338). |
The
Pharmaceutical Journal