Top immune research scientists weigh in on H1N1

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Kim Smith Dedam

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October 9, 2009

By KIM SMITH DEDAM The Press Republican Fri Oct 09, 2009, 11:28 PM EDT

SARANAC LAKE — Four research doctors took an hour away from an international conference at Trudeau Institute Friday to answer questions about Novel H1N1 virus, flu vaccine and their ongoing work.

About 50 of the world's top infectious-disease scientists convened here this weekend, sharing information from their individual research to better understand human immune systems.

H1N1 virus emerged at a time when science has incredible technology and much more knowledge about how flu bugs work than two years ago.

Science is not far from unlocking hidden secrets of an innate human immune response, the mechanism in a body that knows it has had a disease before, said Dr. Bali Pulendran, an immunologist with Emory Vaccine Center at Emory University.

Pulendran observed how two historically distinct arenas of vaccine science — one working to understand immune response and the other to create effective vaccines — are headed now toward cooperative research.

Trudeau President and Director Dr. David L. Woodland, an expert on influenza, said the new vaccine developed to protect people against H1N1 was made using the exact same methods as regular yearly flu shots.

Scientists are recommending people get the H1N1 vaccine because of what they don't yet know about the bug.

"We simply don't know how serious the pandemic is going to be," Woodland said. "This vaccine is made by the very same methods as regular vaccine. This vaccine will undoubtedly be very, very safe."

Dr. Jay Kolls, professor of medicine and pediatrics at Louisiana State University, is studying the effects of different T-cells in lung diseases in children.

He said the primary goal of their ongoing work is to find ways to bring scientific truth to bear on improved public health.

H1N1 appears to be infecting young people, especially between ages 8 and 15.

It mimics the strange pattern of spread seen with the Spanish flu in 1918, Woodland said, which afflicted healthy, robust young adults.

Scientists believe part of the reason so many people died in the pandemic nearly a century ago was the overwhelming immune response from very healthy bodies.

"An over-exuberant response to the flu can be dangerous," he said.

Elderly people seem to be relatively unaffected by Novel H1N1, and scientists suspect a remnant immune response from earlier exposure to the flu.

Most symptoms of H1N1 virus play out like a bad flu, and people recover in four to seven days.

If the disease generally comes and goes that quickly, then why would people need protection against it?

Woodland said the choice boils down to two questions: do I take a very safe vaccine? Or do I risk getting very sick?

Since children are the H1N1 target population, this flu spreads rapidly through their very social interactions at school and at play.

"I will certainly vaccinate my kids," Woodland said.

Vaccine is one part of a fight against disease being fought on three fronts, Woodland observed: by improved public health and good nutrition; by drugs; and with vaccine.

To win, he said, "you really need all three."

Even if some proportion of the entire population gets vaccine, then the disease will not spread so fast.

Vaccines have largely eradicated many once-common afflictions, including smallpox and measles, mumps and rubella, Woodland said, and immunology is left now to tackle the most challenging bugs: HIV, tuberculosis and influenza

Trudeau Institute scientist Dr. Andrea Cooper coordinated the weekend conference.

She said the approach to studying immune response has moved in recent years from a straight, linear search for vaccine to what she called a more holistic "systems biology."

That's why, even though 50 scientists spent Friday talking about the 10 to 14th power number of beneficial bacteria that live in human guts, they were addressing pandemic concerns.

E-mail Kim Smith Dedam at: kdedam@pressrepublican.com