Researchers at Tulane University have developed an inhaled vaccine against bacterial pneumonia. Dr. Jay Kolls, a corresponding author of the study, says the medication may help curb a disturbing death toll.
According to Kolls, “pneumonia is the number one killer of children in the world across the globe. uh, it’s been that way for about 10 to 15 years…it’s the number one cause of morbidity in the United States.”
Bacterial pneumonia is blamed for nearly eight thousand cases and 520 deaths each year nationwide and Kolls says the inhaled vaccines protected mice against several strains of the illness. Kolls says bacterial pneumonia runs more rampant than you might think. “A fungi bacteria probably accounts for about 40-percent of childhood pneumonia and a greater number of pneumonias in the adulthood,” said Kolls.
Kolls says the inhaled vaccine, whether a liquid or powder, would offer a double-pronged attack against bacterial pneumonia, noting “the way this vaccine was produced in being inhaled it generates a local anti-biotic response in the lung and also it elicits a T-cell response.”
He says, as such, the inhaled vaccine provides much broader protection than current vaccine technology that relies on an intramuscular injection.
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