Australian Firms Begin First Tests of Swine Flu Vaccine

Country Takes Action in Face of 15,000 Cases of New H1N1 Virus and 41 Deaths

By TODD NEALE
Abc News

Two biotechnology companies in Australia have begun the first human trials of a vaccine for the 2009 H1N1 (swine flu) virus.

Scientists at the Australian Institute for Bioengineering and Nanotechnology work on a vaccine in a...

Scientists at the Australian Institute for Bioengineering and Nanotechnology work on a vaccine in a laboratory at the University of Queensland in Brisbane, in this June 29, 2009 file photo. The university has produced Australia's first batch of a new candidate vaccine against the H1N1 swine flu virus, after signing an agreement with US firm Protein Sciences Corporation (PSC) to recreate it in Australia.

(Dave Hunt/AAP Image/AP Photo)

Adelaide-based Vaxine Pty Ltd and Melbourne-based CSL Biotherapies injected the first adult volunteers this week in separate trials starting days apart.

Now in its winter flu season, Australia has reported about 15,000 confirmed cases of the new H1N1 virus and 41 deaths. That has made Australian health officials and drug manufacturers anxious to get a vaccination program under way as soon as possible.

"The demand [for a vaccine] was here yesterday," Nikolai Petrovsky, Vaxine chairman and research director, told the Associated Press.

Vaccine trials are expected to begin shortly in the United States as well. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration's Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee will meet tomorrow to discuss clinical trials of an H1N1 vaccine and vaccine approval. Read more...