Experimental Drug Promises to Kill the Flu Virus in a Day | Hacker News Reader

Experimental Drug Promises to Kill the Flu Virus in a Day

wsj.com

92 pointsmkempe59 comments

Hopefully this is better than Tamiflu.

Years ago I was prescribed Tamiflu and man was it weird. Some of my flu symptoms were greatly reduced, yes, but my brain felt like it was always on edge. For people who have done hallucinogens, it was like that edge of being about ready to trip, but never actually seeing visuals. It was not fun. I had trouble sleeping and just wanted the medication to be over with.

I looked it up later and discovered it had some interesting brain interactions and side-effects in line with what I experienced.

I'm up to date on my shots, but avoid the flu vaccine because ever time I've tried it, it makes my arm hurt (if that's the injection point) for about 3 days. I thought I'd get a tolerance eventually, but never did. It's not as bad as getting the flu, but it's still annoying enough I still avoid it.

> It's not as bad as getting the flu

Arm soreness is nowhere near as bad as getting the flu, not even the same ballpark. I get my jab annually and in exchange for those few days of soreness I can't remember the last time I had the flu. No idea what the Tamiflu side effects are like, they sound nasty -- unfortunately I've never had opportunity to take it.

And if you remember to massage the arm at the injection site throughout the day, you’ll vastly reduce the residual soreness. Honestly, I get the flu shot each year not for myself, but for everyone else in society that might otherwise die if herd immunity is low.

The first time I got the flu shot (after experiencing what seemed to be the flu a couple times, with a high fever) it felt like a "mini-flu" experience for roughly a day. I definitely felt quite ill, but it was over reasonably quickly. In subsequent years, I have had neither a reaction nor the flu after my shot.

As someone who hates needles, I would gladly have the flu 10 times a year than get one shot! But I work from home so I rarely get it or have the chance to be contagious.

I had the flu a few times as a kid. I didn’t ever think it was that bad. I had the flu 2 years ago and I wasn’t right for a month. As you get older you immune system weakens and 3-5 days of 102-103 fever is enough to make you think you’re dying.

Maybe it was some stronger mutation? I had flu 2 years ago as well and it knocked me down for a month and then took another 5 months to recover fully, i.e. it kicked me back fitness-wise almost half a year. Still having some minor sleep issues since.

Actually it's the opposite. Young adults often have a very strong (too strong?) immune response that can make them very sick.

I personally hate needles as well - BUT every time I get the flu shot I just tell the nurse/pharmacist that I really don't like needles...they know how to work around that..

It's basically a combination of "never see the needle, look the other way, and no I'm not going to tell you exactly when I'm going to do it." Granted my needle-anxiety isn't extreme enough to pass out or go into a panic-attack.

Basically: your resistance to getting vaccinated due to hating needles may be easily overcome by telling the person vaccinating you that you hate needles.

I hadn't ever gotten anything resembling the flu in many years, but then I started spending every day in an open plan office. After being sick with a high fever a couple times, I started getting flu shots.

I suspect you've never had flu or else you'd not contemplate having it 10 times in a year. Many people confuse flu with the common cold. It's actually an order of magnitude or so more unpleasant and much less commonly experienced. Perhaps a once every 10 years or so thing for most people.

I hate needles as well, but I would rather take the injections than have the flu. (And recently I'm even more eager to take the vaccine, since I have a small child, and being knocked out of commission for several days is a very unappealing option.)

The flu can leave lasting damage to your heart. You wouldn't live very long having the flu 10 times a year.

A cold 10 times, sure. A proper flu 10 times in a year would probably leave you in an extremely critical situation.

You can get the vaccine as a nasal spray if you really hate needles.

Doesn't work as well and is now actively discouraged by current guidelines. The immunity induced is so much lower that it's almost not worth it.

To back it up:

https://www.cdc.gov/flu/protect/vaccine/quadrivalent.htm

tamiflu was proved to be almost entirely ineffective, and in the case of Australia at least, an expensive scam.

https://ama.com.au/ausmed/govt-stands-tamiflu-despite-damnin...

I think I've only had tamiflu once, and it was when I had swine flu in 2009. I don't recall side effects, but probably anything it did was so much more mild than the 104F fever I had before I started taking it.

Unfortunately the H3 part of current flu vaccines have about 13% efficiency according to this article:

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/ldquo-the-problem...

Interestingly, this drug was in-licensed by Roche, makers of Tamiflu!

Tamiflu had a brief but exciting effect on the apparently otherwise stable price of star anise. I kept the box I'd been issued during the h1n1 hong kong scare ( I travel in Asia for work) well past its lifetime. Now it looks like a feeble nineteen fifties failed anti radiation pill, something which might work but nobody knows

Shionogi has an impressive set of drugs coming along.[1]

[1] http://www.shionogi.co.jp/en/company/pmrltj0000000u4v-att/e_...

Not really. Looking at their list:

* Japan Phase III: 4 only. Know that these are totally on a different level as Global Phase III's, since you would require a bunch of additional studies with global clinical trials to secure a FDA approval or EU approval abroad. That's very costly and they don't follow the pattern of other companies that conduct Japan Phase III at the same time as global trials.

* They have mostly a lot of Phase I and II compounds, which have a low success rate anyway - Maybe one out of 10 will make it.

* the indications they target are not "white space" there's already a lot of competition out there, so this is going to make for small revenues for most of them if they ever come out.

* You can see that most of the drugs in development do not come from in-house efforts. Shire/Lilly/Roche, basically they rely a lot on their ability to partner with other companies because their own portfolio is really weak.

* They are very well known in Japan to be hungry to partner with other companies since they have no blockbuster in sight internally. That's why you find them co-promoting many competitors' drugs with their reps. They are doing that recently with a ADHD drug from Shire (Intuniv) but that's just one example, there are many others (Cymbalta with Lilly, etc...)

I've said it before and I'll say it again: GODS I love living in the future! I don't even care that I don't have a jetpack.

I don't feel like circumventing the WSJ paywall, so I haven't read the article. But, I do know a bit about the flu virus. I'm annoyed they refer to 'killing' the virus since the virus isn't alive and its activity is not the primary destructive issue. Over-reaction of our immune system is the vast majority of what makes people feel sick and kills them. Cytokine storms cause "flu like symptoms" and it's why so many diseases begin with them. It's not cell damage caused by cells invaded with flu virus exploding into a spray of new viral particles. That does little on its own.

For years, though, people have been working on a vaccine or similar which can cause the immune system to target the virus itself rather than its 'shell' which evolves quickly and plays little role in its harm (although it may play a role in its infectivity since we see different levels of spread of different strains who differ almost entirely in the structure of their capsid). That doesn't sound like a 'pill that will kill the flu in a day' though. The only thing I can imagine is that such a pill would be a immunosuppressant that prevents the cytokine storm that makes you feel sick while (I would hope) preserving enough immune function to actually eliminate the viral particles?

Better non-paywalled article covering a larger set of new drugs https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-02-08/flu-relie...

extreme misuse and the virus will likely adapt around the drug.

Is this even true? I know bacteria adapt to resist anti-biotics, but this is not the same thing at all.

IIUC this would be more like humans developing resistance to cyanide.

Yes it is true. Influenza and HIV viruses’ mutate very quickly such that one year’s vaccine may not work next year, hence why health professionals advocate flu shot every year. Most vaccinations will last for life time though. CDC and WHO analyze virus samples each year to determine virus mutation and antiviral resistance.

Though it is cruical to note that although vaccine is effective, immunity may not developed for a small percentage of population. But please don’t risk your life - I highly suggest go for vaccination. Hong Kong has the worst outbreak this year as the public has low awareness of flu shot, forcing primary school students and below to go on holiday early. Hong Kong’s neighbor, Macu, with high population density, has the highest vaccination participation - has much fewer cases.

Lastly, please make sure you are getting quardrivalent flu vaccine (aka four-flu shot) which covers all four types of flu; some years ago flu vaccines only cover three types (it was a “gambling game”). In the US you shouldn’t have to worry, but double check; outside of the Us please triple check...

https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/viruses/change.htm

The capsid that covers the harmful part of the flu virus mutates and is why immunity does not transfer from year to year or strain to strain. The capsid is only the outermost part of the viral particle, however. Anything which targets the inner part would be far more effective. Researchers have been working on getting to that part and are finally starting to get close. HIV is a whole different ball of wax from flu, though, and I wouldn't discuss them in the same way.

I agree HIV is a whole different ball game, but I thought it was a good (common) analogy. But you are right.

Bu this article is not about vaccine, it is about an anti-viral! Chalk and cheese

> This process works as follows: a person infected with a particular flu virus develops antibody against that virus. As antigenic changes accumulate, the antibodies created against the older viruses no longer recognize the “newer” virus, and the person can get sick again. Genetic changes that result in a virus with different antigenic properties is the main reason why people can get the flu more than one time. This is also why the flu vaccine composition must be reviewed each year, and updated as needed to keep up with evolving viruses.

Yes that is how a vaccine works. This new drug is not a vaccine it is an anti-viral. It does not rely on immunity so it would be pointless to extrapolate your knowledge of vaccines to anti-virals.

There is no information in the article to suggest that influenza is likely to be able to use a similar mutation strategy to become resistant to this anti-viral which has an entirely different method of operation.

If you would like to post a source about anti-viral immunity then I would be interested to read it, but sources about vaccines are irrelevant.

https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/season/vaccine-selection.htm

The information I gave was relevant and explained the correlation. But if you are not convinced, read above.

Vaccine is one common way for an animal (including humans) to become immune to a targeted virus. That’s the purpose of receiving a vaccine, otherwise you would have to catch a real flu (of all classification) in order to develop immunity. As virus changes its structures, our immune system may not be able to recongize the new virus, thus we get sick, and therefore pharmaceutical companies have to develop a new vaccine. If flu virus doesn’t mutate, we would only have one type and one shot would be suffice for life time. I hope this helps.

  which covers all four types of flu

Um, no. There are 4 categories of flu (influenzavirus A/B/C/D), but there are almost 200 possible unique HN strain combinations of type A alone (not all of which affect humans). Maybe FI6 will direct us to a universal vaccine against all type A variants, but we're not nearly there yet.

I have a feeling that some people make it sound as if a flu was the end of the world. (Get the shot! Triple check it's a four flu shot! Never go without!)

I never vaccinate and sometimes I get a flu. That means I'm mildly uncomfortable for a few days, and that's it.

For an otherwise healthy person, the benefit of a flu shot is about as high as the risks. Unless you're unhealthy, or in some other special risk group, flu shots are not necessary. The risk of contracting a super-evil new mega-deadly version of the flu is practically negligible, unless you live in a special risk area.

If you’re “mildly uncomfortable for a few days” then you don’t have the flu. And by not vaccinating, you’re putting others at risk who could die from it.

Adults of my local area never vaccinate from flu. Asian flu breakthrough killed few people last decade, but it had no treatment anyway. Seems that that “risk” statement contradicts with reality at least in one region. Not saying it is wrong in general, but something to think of.

What region is this where only a few people died from the flu in a decade? The annual death toll in the US is tens of thousands, so I have a hard time believing this.

I’ll reply in detail later this day, but shallow research says that I must be wrong. In short, 40% of Tatarstan adults are vaccinated (surprisingly; in “private companies” we never ever speak about that, nor do it). Death count is still unclear though, stats hard to find.

Respectfully, I don't think it's helpful for you to tell me what I did or did not suffer from. Maybe we just have different standards of how uncomfortable different things are to us. (Yeah, it's different from a common cold.)

Also, when I'm ill I naturally stay at home, and don't go out to sneeze or cough on people.

The period when you’re contagious doesn’t necessarily line up with the period when you feel bad.

I don't think you're supposed to be infectious for more than a week plus a couple of days at most. Admittedly, there is a short time window where you might be shedding while still asymptomatic. Still, as long as you keep your hands clean (which you should do anyways) and don't cough on people (which you won't if you're asymptomatic) and maybe refrain from shaking hands for a few extra days after having been ill the remaining risks are negligible. We're already entering regions of unlikelihood here where we're bordering on picking nits. You could just as well stand next to a road and yell at the drivers for gassing civilians.

Considering that deaths from the flu are of similar magnitude to traffic fatalities, I’d say it’s more like yelling at drivers for running red lights, failing to yield to pedestrians, or changing lanes without looking, and justifying it on the basis that they’d rather deal with the occasional fender bender than take basic precautions.

4 local (west of Toronto) children have died this winter just this past week from symptoms from the flu, including a healthy 10 year old boy in my daughter's school. In fact 3/4 of the children who've passed away this year had no immune compromising complications.

4 from the same strain of flu or were these separate cases?

It's not clear. And it's also not clear if this was a strain the (fairly ineffective) vaccine this year would have helped with.

But this is just to say -- flu might not be a big deal to some, and I've always treated it that way -- until you see a perfectly health kid die.

Yes, I know what you mean. This being said, even the best flu vaccine (depending on each year) is only about 50-60% effective, so the push to "get your vaccine and you'll be safe" is largely moot. Nobody tells such figures to the public.

I don’t understand why a ~50% effectiveness is so often held up as a reason that the vaccine is worthless. Getting the flu sucks, and occasionally kills people. Getting the vaccine is cheap/free and takes five minutes. It would be worthwhile even if it was only 10% effective.

You say that as if the shot is risk free. The cases adjudicated by The Court of Federal Claims proves this is not the case. (PDF, skip to page 7) http://www.uscfc.uscourts.gov/sites/default/files/FY16-Repor... All reports for recent years: http://www.uscfc.uscourts.gov/reports-statistics

To win a case in this court, you not only have to be aware the court and the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program https://www.hrsa.gov/vaccine-compensation/index.html you can only make a claim if the interaction of the vaccine with your particular combination of DNA results in a limited set of symptoms within specific time frames. (PDF) https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/pubs/pinkbook/downloads/appendi...

I wash my hands. A lot. Yes, that doesn’t cover all the transmission vectors but it covers a lot. I limit my exposure. For example, I’ll go home if someone is sick at work and refuses to do so. I supplement 8,000 IU vitamin D as recent studies have found this is what is necessary to achieve nominal serum vitamin D levels for someone at my BMI. Some 40-60% of people are vitamin D deficient in the US, btw.

Nothing is risk free, but the flu vaccine comes pretty close. There’s a reason the CDC recommends it for nearly everyone: the benefits greatly outweigh the small risk. I’ll trust them over a court adjudicating a program whose main purpose is to calm people’s irrational fears of vaccines.

From some quick searching, the only serious side effect from the flu vaccine I could find was a 1-2 per million incidence of Guillain-Barré syndrome. The link is still highly uncertain, and in any case that’s still quite a bit safer than something like ibuprofen.

The flu vaccine is the least studied of all vaccines due to the rapid development cycle. There are no hard safety studies, there simply isn’t enough time in a 12 month product development cycle to perform them. If you know of any, link your citations.

As far as why the CDC recommends vaccines, it important to consider that regulatory body owns numerous patents on various vaccine components. Not saying this is their sole motive, just that a profit motive exists. https://www.google.com/search?tbo=p&tbm=pts&hl=en&q=vaccine%...

I’d say there’s pretty good evidence for the vaccine’s safety just from the fact that tens or hundreds of millions of people get it every year, and the only seriously bad effect that’s been noticed is a possible 1-2 per million incidence of Guillain-Barré syndrome.

When I search to see how much money the CDC makes from vaccine patents, I get a vast sea of wacko anti-vaccine sites, plus a few debunkers mixed in. So I’m not convinced, to put it mildly.

> get your vaccine and you'll be safe

I’ve never seen it messaged that way. Most of the ads I’ve seen have focused on protection others, especially at-risk family members.

Children and old people are risk groups. Sorry I didn't make that clear.

...and healthy young adults were "the risk group" for the 1918 pandemic.

Anicdote: in my teens I worked on a turkey egg production farm. Due to this it was mandatory for me to get a flu shot. Every single time I had one, I would vomit a few hours later and have other flu symptoms for a day or two.

Ever since leaving that job I haven't had the shot, and I've never had any flu like illness

My dad hasn't had the shot in my life time yet. I don't know if he ever had it before I was old enough to remember. He's now 52 and I can only recall two times he ever had the flu

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