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A new hepatitis C vaccine has shown promising results in an early clinical trial at Oxford University in Britain, generating strong and broad immune responses, according to the results published Wednesday in the journal Science Translational Medicine.
Hepatitis C is a leading cause of liver cirrhosis and can in some cases lead to liver failure and liver cancer. Currently, drugs are expensive and require a prolonged course of treatment. Having an effective vaccine could make a difference to preventing infection with hepatitis C.
The vaccine strategy developed by the Oxford University team uses two separate vaccine formulations. The approach is designed to first stimulate, or 'prime,' an initial immune response against the hepatitis C virus with the first vaccine. Then eight weeks later, the second vaccine aims to 'boost' the immune response to a level that would offer protection against infection.
The results showed that the vaccine was safe and well tolerated in the 15 healthy human volunteers who took part in the phase 1 safety trial.
It found that, the T cell responses seen in the volunteers who received the prime-boost vaccine were large, broad and sustained over the 6 months of the study. They were comparable to those seen in people who are naturally able to clear hepatitis C infection.
A trial to test the efficacy of the vaccine is now underway among intravenous drug users in two sites in the US. It is the first hepatitis C vaccine to reach this stage of clinical trials.
According to Professor Ellie Barnes from Oxford University, who participated the research, the size and breadth of the immune responses seen in the healthy volunteers are "unprecedented in magnitude for a hepatitis C vaccine."
