CHICAGO, Feb. 23 (UPI) -- U.S. scientists say they have developed a lab-made antibody that works against a wide range of flu viruses and can be made quickly in large quantities.
The claims were made in an article published Sunday in the medical journal Nature Structural & Molecular Biology by Dr. Wayne Marasco of the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Robert Liddington of the Burnham Institute for Medical Research in La Jolla, Calif., the Chicago Tribune reported.
The pair said they led a team that developed an antibody that works against a range of influenza A viruses. Tested so far only in mice, Marasco and Liddington said it was effective against seasonal flu, the H5N1 bird flu strain now circulating in Asia and the strain that caused a flu pandemic in 1918 that killed an estimated 50 million people, the newspaper said.
Health officials cautioned against saying the antibody could be a "magic bullet" against fears of another flu pandemic. They told the Tribune because monoclonal antibodies are expensive to produce, they are likely -- even if effective -- to be used only as a stopgap until cheaper vaccines can be developed.
