Based on the initial results of ongoing local clinical tests, a vaccine
developed by a French pharmaceutical company can provide protection against
four strains of the deadly dengue virus for five years and without visible side
effects.
This was the welcome announcement
made Wednesday by an infectious disease specialist who is a member of the
clinical trial team.
"Most of the subjects [who
were given the complete vaccine or all three doses] have proven to be immune
against dengue for five years with no side effect which shows a lot of promise
for the vaccine," Dr. Maria Rosario Capeding of the Research Institute for
Tropical Medicine (RITM) told the Inquirer.
During Wednesday's forum of the
Philippine Pediatrics Society (PPS) Inc., Capeding said that they expected to
complete final tests on the vaccine by the end of the year. (See related story
on Page A24.)
According to her, of the more
than 3,000 subjects in the clinical tests conducted in Manila, close to half
received all three doses of the vaccine developed by Sanofi Pasteur Inc. Most
of the participants were between the ages of 2 and 45 and residents of the
cities of Manila, San Pablo and Cebu.
Capeding described the vaccine as
tetravalent or designed to protect against all four dengue virus strains.
During the forum, she also
clarified that experts have yet to discover a cure for the deadly illness as
she stressed that what was important was for the patient to be immediately
brought to a medical facility as soon as symptoms such as fever, headaches,
joint pains, stomachaches and vomiting appear.
Capeding, meanwhile, said that
experiments were still being conducted on the efficacy of certain plants or
herbs, particularly "tawa-tawa," against dengue or other viruses.
"We are trying to determine
their potency and the toxins they possess which could have an effect on
viruses," she said as she added, "There is still no advisory on the
use of tawa-tawa so it is possible that its reported effect of increasing the
blood platelet [count] could [just] be a coincidence."
Jeannette I. Andrade
Philippine Daily Inquirer/Asia
News Network
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