Mar 6, 2016

Chickenpox vaccine trialed in UK hospitals – The Independent

Hospitals in the UK are trialling a brand-new vaccine which prevents kids from making chickenpox. 

Vaccines for the ailment are currently readily available in Germany and the US, yet is not included in the UK’s timetable childhood vaccination programme, and just available to vulnerable groups. 

The NHS website explains that it is not timetable in the UK as a result of fears it could trigger chickenpox and shingles in older people, which can easily lead to a lot more severe complications. 

The study will certainly test exactly how safe and efficient a brand-new version of a vaccine called Varilrix is, and will certainly involve kids aged in between 12 and 23 months. 

Scientists estimate that the vaccine, which was licensed in the UK in 2013, gives 98 per cent protection versus chicken pox in kids and 75 per cent in adolescents and adults. 

Chickenpox, caused by the varicella-zoster virus, is a common and relatively mild condition which lasts in between 5 to 10 days.

Symptoms contain a red rash, and itchy spots that transform in to blisters. 

However, in vulnerable kids and adults, it can easily trigger severe conditions such as pneumonia, skin infections, and mind swelling, known as encephalitis. 

The study is being conducted at the NIHR Wellcome Trust Southampton Clinical Research Facility and St George’s Hospital in south London, also as sites in Bristol and Oxford. 

Katrina Cathie, a consultant paediatrician and principal investigator for the study at Southampton Children’s Hospital, said her group is “really pleased” to be portion of the “exciting trial.”

“While chickenpox is regularly a mild ailment which lasts for a couple of weeks, it can easily still be quite uncomfortable and unpleasant for kids while, in the worst cases – particularly among those along with underlying good health conditions – it can easily lead on to respiratory infection, skin infection and mind inflammation.”

She explained that the study will certainly investigate whether a brand-new version of the vaccine must be developed, by monitoring exactly how the temperature of participants change, also as signs of fever.  

“Through this study, we will certainly locate out if a brand-new version of the vaccine is much better compared to the latest version,” she said.

Additional reporting by PA 

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