Developing a universal flu vaccine?

A vaccine that helps against all types of influenza — for several years? If all goes right for Norwegian company Bionor Pharma ASA, such a vaccine could exist within a few years. Every year, experts develop a new vaccine to best combat the coming annual flu wave, based on the previous year’s virus and others expected to arrive. Developing a vaccine that meets its mark, however, is a true challenge. The year 2010 presented major challenges because scientists have only limited experience in dealing with flu seasons following a pandemic such as the outbreak of swine flu in many countries in 2009. The complexity of flu transmission in the Southern Hemisphere compounds the difficulty of predicting which virus will emerge as the most predominant in, say, Norway. The vaccine that Bionor Pharma’s scientists are developing will be less dependent on which form the various flu viruses take. Triggers immune cells “Vaccines for seasonal flu consist...