World's First Dengue Vaccine Approved After 20 Years of Research

[Scott Bernard]

Unsa kaha ang side effects ani. Tsk! Tsk!

Basin maka infertile or naa ni defects... This is still untested grounds.

[gracie7]

Philippines is first Asian country to approve dengue vaccine

Paris (AFP) - The Philippines became the first Asian country on Tuesday to approve the sale of the world's first-ever dengue vaccine.

Dengvaxia, manufactured by French pharmaceutical giant Sanofi, secured its first regulatory approval in Mexico a fortnight ago and is currently being reviewed by around 20 countries in Asia and Latin America.

It is hoped the drug could eventually help prevent millions of deaths from dengue, the world's fastest-growing mosquito-borne disease.




"It's a major step in the prevention of dengue and for public health," Olivier Charmeil, head of Sanofi's vaccines division, said in a statement.

Scientists have long been stumped by dengue, which has four separate strains, forcing researchers to find a drug able to fight all of them at once.

Clinical tests -- carried out on 40,000 people from 15 countries -- have found Dengvaxia can immunise two-thirds of people aged nine years and older, rising to 93 percent for the more severe form of the disease, dengue haemorrhagic fever.

It was also found to reduce the risk of hospitalisation by 80 percent.

Dengue can trigger a crippling fever, along with muscle and joint pain. There is no known cure, and children are at particular risk.

The deadliest form of the disease kills 22,000 people a year, the WHO says.

It was once considered a disease of the tropics, endemic in only nine countries, but globalisation, urbanisation, climate change and jet travel are helping it to move into more temperate zones.

It is now endemic in more than 100 countries.

The WHO says cases have risen 30-fold over the last 50 years, with more than half the world's population potentially at risk.

Several million doses of the vaccine are ready to ship, and Sanofi expects annual production to reach 100 million doses by 2017.

Sanofi's research and development work took 20 years, costing more than 1.5 billion euros ($1.6 billion).

But the vaccine could bring the company more than $1 billion annually starting in 2018 or 2019, analysts said.

Other pharmaceutical companies are developing dengue vaccines, including US firm Merck, Japan's Takeda and Britain's GlaxoSmithKline, but Sanofi is ahead of the competition.


Source: Philippines is first Asian country to approve dengue vaccine

[yhokz101]

Unsa kaha ang side effects ani. Tsk! Tsk!

Basin maka infertile or naa ni defects... This is still untested grounds.

true.. im kind of skeptical with this but what the hell. People resort on different things if naka dengue na ila anak o love ones..

I wish this has been available in the past daghan pa unta na luwas mga bata..

This could have been fully untested but I give this vaccine a benefit of a doubt nalang pod kaysa wala.

[Scott Bernard]

Philippines is first Asian country to approve dengue vaccine

Paris (AFP) - The Philippines became the first Asian country on Tuesday to approve the sale of the world's first-ever dengue vaccine.

Dengvaxia, manufactured by French pharmaceutical giant Sanofi, secured its first regulatory approval in Mexico a fortnight ago and is currently being reviewed by around 20 countries in Asia and Latin America.

They are using Asia and Latin America as human guinea pigs for this vaccine.

I urge (or suggest) all, who in dire circumstances your family members are having fever more than 2-3 days, immediately undergo platelet count or CBC. IMHO, the window period of 2-3 days is enough mitigation and preparation of impending dengue fatal effects.

I'd rather do it than exposing my loved ones with this untested vaccine.

[dhie221]

Hindi ba pinoy ang naka imbento nito? Ang alam ko dati nang meron nito e parang tinatago lang ng gobyerno para mahal yung price nya.

[gqerfd]

That really takes a long time to develop the vaccine as a complexity of reasons involved for the design. Drug discovery process is far difficult beyond our imagination.

[gracie7]

Department of Health (DOH) Secretary Janet Garin on Monday announced that the dengue vaccine will enter the Philippine market next week.

"Philippines is the only country where three phases of the clinical trial were done... It's a reflection of how good our researchers are," Garin explained in a television interview.

Garin added that the government has already set P3 billion in the 2016 budget for the dengue vaccine.
She said the dengue vaccine is expensive because only one company is producing it, the Sanofi Pasteur.

The Philippines was given a discount when the Department of Finance met with the company's executives during the APEC Summit in November.

An additional discount of 34 percent was given to the Philippines after President Benigno Aquino III met with another executive in France, she said.

"When the President visited Paris for the COP21 [21st Conference of Parties], he had a meeting with the executive of this company and we were given an additional 34 percent discount," she said.

Garin, meanwhile, said that part of the amount from the sale of dengue vaccine to private patients will be used to subsidize the government's beneficiaries.

However, the dengue vaccine is only recommended for people who are 9 to 45 years old.

"We don't recommend it [above 45 years old] because there would be other interactions. You would've been exposed to many diseases. The safety has not been established that well if you inject it above 45 years old... That is why we want to play on the safe side," she explained.

As for the government, Garin said that the vaccine will be given to Grade 4 to Grade 5 students or children from nine to 10 years old since they are the usual victims of dengue.

According to the Health secretary, the Philippines has been spending P16 billion a year to combat dengue.
Most dengue cases were recorded in the National Capital Region (NCR), Region III, and Region IV-A.

[dirk14]

with the vaccine doesnt mean dli nata mo limpyo sa tugkaran.. mo kompyansa bya dayn....

[gracie7]

with the vaccine doesnt mean dli nata mo limpyo sa tugkaran.. mo kompyansa bya dayn....

Mao gyud, uban ani mukompyansa nlang. Psagdaan nlang surroundings. What if ang silingan can't afford, luoy sad.

[anggwaponi]

--- updating ---








Pinoy doc gets P64-M grant for dengue research
NOTE: News link courtesy of MSN.com