Avian Influenza Research Today is a free monthly online journal that collates and summarizes the latest research about Avian Influenza, including details on bird flu, h5n1, risks, vaccines, prevention.

Efficacy of inactivated vaccines against H5N1 avian influenza infection in ducks.

Middleton D, Bingham J, Selleck P, Lowther S, Gleeson L, Lehrbach P, Robinson S, Rodenberg J, Kumar M, Andrew M

Australian Animal Health Laboratory, CSIRO Livestock Industries, PO Bag 24, Geelong, Victoria, 3220 Australia. deborah.middleton@csiro.au

The current Asian H5N1 highly pathogenic avian influenza virus has spread over much of Asia and into Europe and Africa. As well as affecting village and commercial chicken operations in many South East Asian countries, it differs from past H5 avian influenza viruses in that it causes morbidity and mortalities in other domesticated birds, such as ducks and turkeys and in wild water birds. Effective vaccines that can prevent infection, as well as disease, and be used in a variety of avian species are needed for field use. In this report, a bivalent H5N9+H7N1 oil emulsion vaccine is compared, in ducks, to a monovalent H5N3 oil emulsion vaccine that has been derived by reverse genetics with an H5 from A/chicken/Vietnam/C58/04. While both vaccines protected against morbidity, the monovalent vaccine provided effective protection, with no evidence of shedding of the challenge virus and no serological response to the H5N1 challenge virus.

Published 12 February 2007 in Virology, 359(1): 66-71.
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