A new tuberculosis vaccine that can help stamp out the disease worldwide has been developed by researchers at McMaster University in Canada The vaccine was produced from a genetically modified version of the cold virus and is intended to function as a booster for the Bacillus Calmette-Guerin (BCG) vaccine which is the only TB vaccine currently available on the market.
According to Professor Zhou Xing, the new vaccine helps reactivate immunity in people who have already been inoculated with the BCG vaccine. BCG is “no longer effective enough to curb the global tuberculosis threat. So we need new tools,” he added.
The World Health Organization estimates that 8.7 million people contracted tuberculosis in 2011. In the same year, 1.4 million people died from the disease.
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