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Beyond the Egg: PowderMed Joins Avian Flu Efforts

 
• By Chris Morrison

That threat of an avian flu pandemic and the well-publicized manufacturing mishaps and shortages plaguing standard egg-based annual flu vaccine production has spurred a handful of biotechnology companies to scramble to get alternative avian flu vaccines into development. Most recently in early August PowderMed Ltd., the Chiron Corp. spin-out developing DNA vaccine technology, said it would follow up on the early clinical success of its next-generation annual flu vaccine by developing a vaccine for pandemic avian flu.

Despite the confusion intrinsic to the old conundrum, in the case of influenza vaccine production, the egg most definitely came first. Flu strains are currently grown in and harvested from fertilized chicken eggs in a process that takes upwards of nine months. But the shortcomings and limitations of egg-based vaccine production are catching up to the 50-year old technology as worldwide governments become increasingly concerned about a potentially looming pandemic of avian influenza.

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