Archived Public Lecture: How Vaccines Train the Immune System in Ways No One Expected
Maury Strauss Distinguished Public Lecture presented by the Fralin Biomedical Research Institute at VTC
Archived Public Lecture: How Vaccines Train the Immune System in Ways No One Expected
Date: Apr. 15, 2021
Time: 5:30 p.m. - 6:30 p.m.
About This Lecture
Unknown to most people, vaccines were never tested for their effects on overall health before being introduced; everybody was so certain that vaccines only affect the target infection that it did not seem necessary. Our population-based studies in one of the world’s poorest countries, Guinea-Bissau, have revealed that this assumption was too simplistic. It has become clear that vaccines do not only protect against the target infection; they also affect the susceptibility to other infections. We have called these effects the “non-specific effects” of vaccines. Immunological studies have now provided a biological mechanism by showing that vaccines modulate the innate immune system. The findings challenge our understanding of vaccines and the immune system. The implications are far-reaching: hundreds of thousands of lives could be saved every year in low-income countries and morbidity and health expenditure could be reduced significantly in high-income countries, by taking non-specific effects of vaccines into account when designing vaccination programs.
Additional Details
This is a free event hosted by Dr. Michael Friedlander and the Fralin Biomedical Research Institute. For more information, please call 540-526-2059 or send an e-mail.
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Article ItemVaccine expert to deliver Maury Strauss public lecture , article
Christine S. Benn, professor at the University of Southern Denmark’s Centre for Global Health, will discuss her research in an upcoming talk, “How Vaccines Train the Immune System in Ways No One Expected,” hosted by the Fralin Biomedical Research Institute at VTC. Benn’s lecture will be presented virtually via Zoom at 5:30 p.m. on April 15.
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Christine S. Benn, M.D., Ph.D., D.M.Sc.
Professor, Open Patient data Explorative Network, Centre for Global Health, University of Southern Denmark/Odense University Hospital
Steering Board Memeber, The Bandim Health Project, Guinea-Bissau