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February 12, 2003
U.S. IMMUNIZATION NEWS
"Immunity to Smallpox May Linger"
Associated Press (www.ap.org) (02/10/03)
Researcher Mark Slifka and associates from Oregon Health & Science University report preliminary findings indicating that smallpox vaccines given even decades ago may still have surprising levels of immunity. Their experiments involved exposing over 100 blood samples from previously immunized people to the vaccinia virus, which is closely related to smallpox and is used in the vaccine itself. Residual immunity was determined by observing how many blood cells the vaccinia virus killed when it confronted the tissue samples. Slifka et al. have observed signs which indicate that the body's immune system still remembers the virus and mounts one of two responses: antibodies that destroy the viruses before they infect cells, and T-cells that kill infected cells.
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