EU Health Commissioner Vassiliou to EuroFora on Virus AH1N1 Vaccine : Safety is the most important !

Even if the sole body in charge of controling the vaccines is the London-based European Medicine Agency (EMA), which works on a virus' strain given by the only official American Labo, nevertheless, Strasbourg-based European "Pharmacopeia", a CoE's body, already intervned from the start, with preventive controls on the Virus' specimens affected to EMA, and will also inervene before mass distribution to ensure that the produced Vaccines will meet the standards, said to "EuroFora" EU Expet Antoon Di Santo.

- "Safety of Vaccines is the most important issue for us", replied EU Commissioner Vassiliou to "EuroFors"'s question. "So, when vaccines will be certified by the (EU) Comission, we shall be absolutely certain", she promissed. EU has enough Experts at its disposal in order to be able to ensure that, she added.

 

The move is expected to start "before the end of September". Meanwhile, EU Commission already anounced a series of practical measures from now in order to help several EU Member Countries (particularly among the "new", Central-Eastern European States) who don't seem to have enough means to cope alone, to get access to sufficient vaccines in the best possible conditions, thanks to "joint procurements", EU "coordination", etc. As well as in order to focus, at first, on the most exposed parts of the population, (such as Health and other essential public services' agents, pregnant women and children, people with relevant chronic diseases (such as cardio-vascular, diabetes, respiratory, etc), before enough vaccines for all will be produced later-on.

But Vassiliou is aware of a risk for the A H1N1 Virus to "mutate" into a different genetic mix during winter time. - "I hope this doesn't arrive", she said, because things will become much more difficult. It's already a genetic mutation, provoked by unknown causes, which seems to be at the origin of "new" Virus A H1N1 : A "mix" of swine and avian virus with human virus, similar to that of "Spanish Flu" which reportedly killed millions on the sidelines of the 1st World War,

This might explain why the 2009 Pandemics, which progressively stroke all the World, started "at the spot" of such an incident, (i.e. at US Borders between California and/or Texas and Mexico), said to "EuroFora" EU Expert Di Santo, who works at the same EU service which was also in charge of the fight against SARS epidemics in the recent past, which had notoriously originated at a Hong-Kong Labo. 

 - In fact, all flu viruses frequently mutate, more or less : That's why often vaccines are updated to such changes, he observed. But he waqs unable yet to explain why a kind of virus who had disappeared since the "Spanish Flu" at the beginning of the 20th Century, suddenly re-appeared in 2009  in a mutated version.. 

( See EU Commission's preparatory measures in detail at :  http://ec.europa.eu/avservices/player/streaming.cfm?type=ebs&sid=147317)