Via Google News, a CP report by Helen Branswell: Canada-U.S. may go different routes on pandemic vaccine production. Excerpt:
Canada and the United States may go separate ways when deciding whether powerful boosting compounds called adjuvants should be added to swine flu vaccines, experts suggest.
Canada will likely use adjuvanted swine flu vaccine, says Dr. David Butler-Jones, head of the Public Health Agency of Canada.
But it is not a slam-dunk that regulatory authorities south of the border will clear adjuvanted flu vaccines for a U.S. mass vaccination campaign - if one takes place - this fall, some American experts say.
"The risk-benefit of using an adjuvant in a population in which you don't have a lot of data, i.e. younger people . . . has to be balanced against ... what's going on," says Dr. Anthony Fauci, head of the U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.
"What's going on in our summer here? In the Southern Hemisphere's winter there? All of those things are going to be playing into the decision of what you're going to use or not use."
Ultimately decisions on whether to license pandemic vaccines with adjuvants will be the job of each country's regulatory agency - Health Canada here and the Food and Drug Administration in the U.S.
They and sister agencies elsewhere will face tough decisions in the weeks ahead, decisions that will likely have to be made with less data than such bodies typically require for the licensure of new vaccines or drugs.
