Clinical, scientific and ethnographic studies of influenza in quarantine

Abstract

From the time of the Spanish influenza pandemic in 1918 to the present seclusion of volunteers in quarantine units, either modified hotels, Phase I units or specially constructed clinics, have been key in investigating new vaccines and antivirals. Carefully selected healthy, young volunteers undergo a 10–12-day sojourn under intense medical supervision. Clinical sampling includes nasal and throat washes for virus recovery, blood for clinical chemistry, analysis of B- and T-cell response and, more recently, analysis of human genes responding to infection. The authors’ studies are resulting in new developments of universal influenza vaccines that could stimulate and prime CD4 and CD8 cells to shared epitopes in all influenza A viruses. Ethnographic study has noted an absence of quarantine stress in the volunteers for the first time.

Keywords::

• antivirals
• ethnography
• host genes
• influenza
• quarantine
• vaccines

Acknowledgements

JS Oxford would like to thank Sylvia Reed, and the late Paul Beare and David Tyrrell, whose work inspired the establishment of the London quarantine unit. Present collaborators are Anthony Gilbert, Rob Lambkin-Williams and Tom Wilkinson. JR Oxford would also like to thank the clinical trial participants who volunteered to take part in the anthropological substudy, and the trial organizers who facilitated the research. Kit Davis, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London gave advice on anthropological fieldwork.

Financial & competing interests disclosure

Grants were received from the Department of Health (UK) to study influenza transmission and more recently from the CDC, USA in collaboration with Jon Van Tam, University of Nottingham and the Virus Transmission Team. JS Oxford is the founder and a shareholder of Retroscreen Virology, a small medium enterprise at Queen Mary College, University of London. The authors have no other relevant affiliations or financial involvement with any organization or entity with a financial interest in or financial conflict with the subject matter or materials discussed in the manuscript apart from those disclosed.

No writing assistance was utilized in the production of this manuscript.