HK to use antibodies to fight swine flu in winter
By Tan Ee Lyn
HONG KONG, Sept 4 (Reuters) - Researchers in Hong Kong are harvesting antibodies from recovered swine flu patients in the hope of using them to treat people who become seriously ill with the disease this winter.
They expect the virus to become more aggressive in the coming winter months, which means more people will get seriously ill, need intensive hospital care or die.
"The virus doesn't need to mutate, but a change in temperature, colder and drier weather will make the virus more aggressive and active and we expect more serious cases," said Ivan Hung, clinical assistant professor at the University of Hong Kong's department of medicine.
Hung told Reuters in an interview their predictions were based on higher mortality rates in some countries in the southern hemisphere which have just been through their colder months.
"This is exactly what happened in Australia, Argentina and Brazil ... where they have shocking mortality rates," he said.
Compared with seasonal flu, which has a mortality rate of 0.06 percent, the swine flu mortality rate in Argentina was 7 percent. It was 13 percent in Brazil and 0.4 percent in Australia, Hung said.
"It's pretty shocking ... and this is what we are expecting in Hong Kong in winter. We are expecting more hospitalisation and more patients to be admitted requiring intensive care and the mortality rate is expected to be much higher than now."
Hong Kong has had nearly 13,000 confirmed cases of swine flu, but experts agree such figures are meaningless because many cases are very mild and go untested and undiagnosed.
Ten people have died in the densely populated city.
Health authorities have begun recruiting recovered swine flu patients in the hope of harvesting antibodies that will specifically target the H1N1 virus.
This is important especially after some recent H1N1 samples were found to be resistant to the drug oseltamivir, or Tamiflu, which is manufactured by Roche (ROG.VX).
Hung said H1N1 specific antibodies would be useful for people on whom the other drug zanamivir, or GlaxoSmithKline's (GSK.L) Relenza, is difficult to administer. Zanamivir is inhaled and that is difficult for people with pneumonia.
"Antibodies will specifically target swine flu, it is very specific. We expect it to be able to eradicate the virus," Hung said. (Editing by Robert Birsel)
Source: Reuters
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