Scientists develop GM TB vaccine for cows

Sydney, July 28: New Zealand scientists are developing a new geneticaly modified (GM) vaccine for curing tuberculosis in cows. The vaccine might also later be helpful in curing the millions of human victims of the disease.

According to The New Zealand Herald, the scientists at AgResearch`s Wallaceville research centre are hoping that the new vaccine will help by "knocking out" up to 10 genes in the bacteria that cause TB in cows, thus making the modified bacteria safe to inject into cows, and potentially into people.

"We have identified genes which can cause disease. If you remove those, you can end up with an organism that no longer causes disease, and some of those organisms perform well as vaccines," says AgResearch scientist Geoff de Lisle.

Around 10 million people contract tuberculosis every year. The killer disease is caused by a bacteria which block the victim`s lungs. It has taken the life of almost 3.5 million people across the world.

AgResearch science manager Paul Atkinson says, "A TB vaccine in cows might also be a vaccine in human beings in the Third World. What the developed world needs is a better drug. What the Third World needs is a vaccine for animals and humans because they can`t afford drugs, and their farming practices are such that a vaccine would break the transmission mechanism."

Disease rates have dropped dramatically in rich countries during the past 200 years with widespread injections of BCG, a compound including a small dose of TB bacteria to help the body develop immunity against it.

But Lisle says that BCG does not work for many people and scientists around the world are looking for a better option.

"What we are doing is state-of-the-art. We are not following the pack, we are up there in front," he says.

Atkinson has told Parliament`s education and science committee that the TB vaccine is the only genetically modified organism (GMO) that the institute is going to test outside containment in the first five years. The scientists expect the vaccine to be ready for Bureau Report