Friday, March 4, 2016
FDA flu vaccine meeting – lots of smart people doing important work, tons of wonk fun
Today’s FDA
meeting to vote on what subtypes next year’s flu vaccine will include was
fascinating. As more than one participant said, our heads hurt by 10am. There
is a lot of work by people all over the globe that goes into figuring out what
nature has planned nine months from now. (An important example of international
cooperation that benefits us all.) Really smart scientists make very educated
guesses based on what is circulating in the Southern Hemisphere right now,
evidence about how the virus will “drift” over the next year, and which
subtypes are the most deadly. In the end, we followed the WHO
guidelines from last month. Luckily for people, this year’s flu season has
been unusually light, in contrast to the year before. Despite substantial
variation in viral strains between countries, we agreed with the best guess of
really smart people at WHO. Like a lot of health policy, they have to plan next
year before this year’s data is complete – build a plan while flying it. Thankfully
we have pilots who’ve been doing this for many years. Hopefully next winter’s
season will be like this winter, and not the year before.