Dear Acting Secretary Speer,
As you know, the United States must prepare for future outbreaks of the Zika virus, but a high-stakes debate has erupted over a deal the federal government may strike with a private company to develop a vaccine. As acting secretary of the US Army, you have an opportunity — and responsibility — to find a workable solution.
The issue is whether the company — in this case, Sanofi Pasteur — should be required to make the vaccine, which is based on technology discovered with US taxpayer funds, affordable for Americans in return for an exclusive license to develop it into a commercial product.
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Why would the US work with a french drugmaker and not a US one?
Congenital ZIKV syndrome does not appear to be associated with maternal disease severity, ZIKV-RNA load at time of infection or existence of prior dengue antibodies.
131 ZIKV-PCR positive pregnant women were scored for clinical disease severity, 6 (4.6%) had mild disease, 98 (74.8%) had moderate disease and 27 (20.6%) severe manifestations of ZIKV infection. There were 58 (46.4%) abnormal outcomes with 9 fetal losses (7.2%) in 125 pregnancies. No associations were found between: disease severity and abnormal outcomes (p=0.961; OR:1.00; 95%CI: 0.796- 1.270); disease severity and viral load (p = 0.994); viral load and adverse outcomes (p=0.667; OR:1.02; 95%CI: 0.922- 1.135); or existence of prior dengue antibodies (88% subjects) with severity score, ZIKV-RNA load or adverse outcomes (p = 0.667; OR 0.78; 95%CI : 0.255 – 2.397).
CONCLUSIONS:
Congenital ZIKV syndrome does not appear to be associated with maternal disease severity, ZIKV-RNA load at time of infection or existence of prior dengue antibodies.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28535184