Articles: pandemics.
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Avian-origin H5/H7 influenza has the potential to cause the next influenza pandemic. Availability of effective vaccines is an essential part of pre-pandemic preparedness. However, avian influenza surface antigens are poorly immunogenic to humans, which necessitates the use of adjuvants to augment the immunogenicity of pre-pandemic influenza vaccines. ⋯ The weighted estimate for the risk ratio of pain/tenderness at injection sites is 1.85 (95% CI: 1.56 to 2.19). The quality of evidence is low to very low for seroprotection (due to indirectness and potential reporting bias) and moderate for pain/tenderness (due to potential reporting bias), respectively. The significantly lower seroprotection rate after aluminum-adjuvanted H5N1 vaccines and the significantly higher risk of pain at injection sites indicate that aluminum salts decrease immunogenicity but increase local reactogenicity of pre-pandemic H5N1 vaccines in humans.
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Influenza A viruses can infect a wide range of hosts, creating opportunities for zoonotic transmission, i.e., transmission from animals to humans, and placing the human population at constant risk of potential pandemics. In the last hundred years, four influenza A virus pandemics have had a devastating effect, especially the 1918 influenza pandemic that took the lives of at least 40 million people. There is a constant risk that currently circulating avian influenza A viruses (e.g., H5N1, H7N9) will cause a new pandemic. ⋯ Despite exceptional advances in the design and development of (pre-)pandemic vaccines, there are still serious challenges to overcome, mainly caused by intrinsic characteristics of influenza A viruses: Rapid evolution and a broad host range combined with maintenance in animal reservoirs, making it near impossible to predict the nature and source of the next pandemic virus. Here, recent advances in the development of vaccination strategies to prepare against a pandemic virus coming from the avian reservoir will be discussed. Furthermore, remaining challenges will be addressed, setting the agenda for future research in the development of new vaccination strategies against potentially pandemic influenza A viruses.
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JMIR mHealth and uHealth · Jun 2018
A New Influenza-Tracking Smartphone App (Flu-Report) Based on a Self-Administered Questionnaire: Cross-Sectional Study.
Influenza infections can spread rapidly, and influenza outbreaks are a major public health concern worldwide. Early detection of signs of an influenza pandemic is important to prevent global outbreaks. Development of information and communications technologies for influenza surveillance, including participatory surveillance systems involving lay users, has recently increased. Many of these systems can estimate influenza activity faster than the conventional influenza surveillance systems. Unfortunately, few of these influenza-tracking systems are available in Japan. ⋯ Flu-Report supports easy access to near real-time information about influenza activity via the accumulation of self-administered questionnaires. However, Flu-Report users may be influenced by selection bias, which is a common issue associated with surveillance using information and communications technologies. Despite this, Flu-Report has the potential to provide basic data that could help detect influenza outbreaks.