China's Sinovac Biotech has developed an H1N1 swine flu vaccine which he claims to be "safe and effective" after just one shot.
The Chinese company is the first drugmaker worldwide to complete clinical trials for an H1N1 swine flu vaccine. Health officials had predicted that two shots per person would be needed to provide swine flu immunity, raising concerns about possible shortages of the vaccine.
More people will be able to be vaccinated in a shorter amount of time, if the claims of the single shot's effectiveness are true.
More than 1,600 volunteers 3 years and older were inoculated last weekend with Sinovac's vaccine, theShanghai Daily reports .
Regulators around the world are expected to start approving swine flu vaccines next month as more clinical trial results come in.
Medical experts say vaccines need to be available quickly and in large quantities to have the greatest impact. Vaccines arrived too late in the 1957 and 1968 flu pandemics to be of much use and flu vaccines had not been developed in the 1918 "Spanish flu" pandemicwhich killed an estimated 50 million.
In the United States, swine flu vaccine testing for children begins at four medical centers nationwide on Wednesday.
A federal health official said that 45 million doses of vaccine will be ready to dispense by Oct. 15, about one-third of what had originally been been promised. The delay is the result of slowdowns in development, testing and packaging .
You can visit the official site of the developer's of this vaccine : Sinovac Biotech Inc.
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