New flu vaccine trial aims to take on all strains

A new flu vaccine aimed at being the first in the world to fight all forms of the virus is about to be tested by Vaccitech, a spin-out from Oxford University's Jenner Institute, on NHS patients.

The vaccine is being developed to try and combat the virus without yearly jabs.

As the 2016 flu vaccine was not as successful at protecting over-65s, English pensioners were being recruited by the NHS to participate in the trial.

Scientists said the new shot could last as many as five years as it targets the core common to all strains and stimulates the body into producing an elevated response to the flu.

NHS chief executive Simon Stevens this year has warned doctors and nurses to brace themselves for a busy winter as particularly virulent strains of the virus were on their way from Australia and New Zealand to Europe.

"The signs […] are that it has been a heavy flu season down there and many hospitals have struggled to cope," he said.

The Vaccitech vaccine study, led by the University of Oxford, will involve almost 500 patients from six different general practitioners surgeries, with Vaccitech's vaccine being administered alongside a programme of placebos and the old vaccine.

Sarah Gilbert, professor of vaccinology at Oxford University and Vaccitech's co-founder, said: "Every year, flu in older adults causes serious illness and sometimes death. We want to improve the situation but in order to do that we need volunteers to help us test a new vaccine."

The flu virus looks like a spherical cushion with a lot of pins sticking out, said Gilbert, with traditional vaccines using surface protein 'pins' on the outside of flu cells to stimulate the production of antibodies, but needing an update every year as different strains had different surface proteins.

The new vaccine, which had been safety-tested on 145 people so far, targets the core proteins of the virus inside the 'cushion' which are virtually the same in all influenza A viruses.