Soon, 'synthetic' vaccine to eradicate polio

A team of scientists is to try to develop a wholly artificial vaccine to combat polio.

Scientists from the US and UK hope to create a safe vaccine by copying the viral genome, rather than having a tiny portion of the disease present in the vaccine, the Independent reported.

Researcher Dave Stuart said that the idea of the synthetic vaccine is that it contains no genome as it's virus free and so it's made, in a way, like a super-chemical, a complicated chemical, that assembles itself to look like the virus but has no way of ever replicating.

Stuart, who is hopeful about their prospects, added that early results with polio are very promising, with synthetic particles being produced and evidence of successful stabilisation.

The scientists hope by artificially replicating the virus, in effect removing its genetic machinery, they can avoid using a weakened version of the virus in the oral medication used today.

In a small number of cases the oral medication provokes a reaction in the patient's gut which allows a reactivated virus to pass out of the body and spread to other unvaccinated individuals.