Australian-led research makes flu vaccine discovery

I’m here at the Doherty Institute in Melbourne in the very lab where this breakthrough has been made. And with me is one of the key researchers who helped make that breakthrough, Professor Catherine Kojiska, Professor Just it’s obviously very hard to explain such a specific breakthrough in layman’s terms, but but what have you discovered here in this lab? So in our study we identified part of influenza B viruses that our, you mean system consistently recognizes. And with this we provide new knowledge into the rational design of long lasting influenza vaccines. And I think that’s the key thing, isn’t it here long lasting which you don’t often get with the influenza vaccine having to get it year after year. There’s been a lot of words thrown around about just how significant this breakthrough is. How significant would you describe it? Well, we think our study is very significant because we identify those parts of the virus that remained unchanged throughout the virus history and they also trigger very strong TC responses. And we know that TC responses predominantly recognize those unchanged, very conserved parts of the virus and that’s why provide long lasting immunity even when. The virus mutates and the new viral variants emerge. And so ideally like obviously there’s a lot of work yet to go before we get to something like a universal flu vaccine. But but what are the next steps from here and where do you hope to end up? So we really hope that those fragments from influenza viruses can be included in a new T cell vaccine that would obviously reduce severity of infections and deaths, especially in children and ameliorate the impact of annual. Influenza epidemics and Speaking of annual influenza epidemics, we are right at the start of this year’s flu season here in Australia. We saw last year one that was a really particularly bad for for children. How are you feeling at the start and what’s what’s your message at the start of this season? So it’s really hard to predict how the influenza season will look like, but what’s important, it’s really important to highlight that the current influenza vaccines are still the best way to combat the annual epidemics. And to get the annual vaccination to protect ourselves and those at high risk of severe influenza disease. Thank you so much for joining us here today as Professor Catherine Kajewska here at the Doherty Institute in Melbourne. A very topical discovery at the start of the flu season, but certainly a message there that for now the best thing you can do is get the job each year.