Scientific American: A New Push for a Universal Flu Vaccine
“If all goes according to plan, the annual flu shot protects about 60 percent of vaccinated people. This year’s inoculation, of course, fell far short of such expectations, safeguarding only one in four vaccinated people who encountered the dominant H3N2 strain. This shortfall injected further momentum into the push to create a universal vaccine that protects against many flu types over time. … Yet the road ahead is littered with obstacles. … Earlier this month the National Institutes of Health announced one experimental vaccine, M-001, is headed into phase II clinical trials…” (Maron, 5/14).