Vaccine Development
Currently, there is no licensed vaccine to protect against HTLV-1 or HTLB-2 in the US. At least 500,000 of the individuals infected with HTLV-1 eventually develop an often rapidly fatal leukemia, while others will develop a debilitative myelopathy, and yet others will experience uveitis, infectious dermatitis, or another inflammatory disorder. HTLV-2 is associated with milder neurologic disorders and chronic pulmonary infections. The novel HTLV-3 and HTLV-4 have been isolated only in a few cases. Human T cell lymphotropic virus types I and II (HTLV-I/II) are endemic in certain areas of the world. They cause two life-threatening diseases, adult T cell leukaemia/lymphoma and tropical spastic paraparesis. A vaccine is needed because in developing countries there are no other feasible preventive interventions against these diseases and in Western countries intravenous drug users at high risk for HTLV-I and HTLV-II infections and the health workers in contact with such populations must be protected. A recombinant adenovirus vector that expresses the HTLV-I envelope glycoprotein env in HeLa cells in the clinical trial stage. A pneumococcalpolysaccharide vaccine has elicited significant increases in concentrations of IgG against all 5 serotypes tested at 1 and 6 months after immunization. While there is no present licensed vaccine, there are many factors which make a vaccine against HTLV-1 feasible. The virus displays relatively low antibody production variability, natural immunity does occur in humans, and experimental vaccination using envelope antigens has been shown to be successful in animal models.
Read more about this topic: Tropical Spastic Paraparesis
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