WHO taps UTMB to lead emerging infectious disease vaccine efforts

The world experts on vaccine development at the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston have received an international designation acknowledging their unique niche in a sphere where research, government regulation and big pharma often collide. UTMB’s Sealy Center for Vaccine Development has been named a World Health Organization Collaborating Center for Vaccine Research, Evaluation and Training on Emerging Infectious Diseases. The designation by WHO makes UTMB only the second university in the Western Hemisphere to receive this designation; the other is the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. This means that UTMB’s vaccine development experts will collaborate with a select team of international experts to help facilitate vaccine research and development against important infectious diseases – for example, figuring out how to get experimental Ebolavaccine candidates to suffering people in the wake of the recent outbreak. “UTMB’s top-tier expertise in vaccine development is acknowledged among scientists across the globe,” said Joachim...