By Andrew Hough
Telegraph.co.uk
06/22/2010
Swiss researchers claimed allergies that blight the lives of 10 million British sufferers could be largely eradicated with a single vaccine.
An allergy conference in London heard the “one size fits all” injection that wards off asthma, eczema, hay fever and even peanut allergies could be on the shelves within four to five years.
Experts say if the jab, known only as CYT003-Qbg10 which has been tested on humans, is properly developed it become the “hail grail” of vaccines due to it helping ward off multiple allergies.
It would be welcome news to the estimated one in five Britons, or 10 million people, who suffer from hay fever.
A trial, conducted by scientists from Cytos Biotechnology, a firm based in Zurich, concluded that a course of the vaccine was almost as good as steroids at keeping asthma under control.
At the jab’s heart are pieces of synthetic DNA similar to those found in the bug that causes tuberculosis or TB.
The DNA fools the body into thinking it is under attack from a dangerous bug, kick-starting a multi-pronged immune response.
A total of 63 asthmatic patients were given the course of the jab or a series of injections of a dummy drug over two or three months.
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