Celiac (Coeliac) disease soon to be a thing of the past? Vaccine in the works.

For those of you who unaware of what Celiac or Coeliac disease (as it’s known to our UK members) Wikipedia offers the following description.

an autoimmune disorder of the small intestine that occurs in genetically predisposed people of all ages from middle infancy onward. Symptoms include chronic diarrhoea, failure to thrive (in children), and fatigue, but these may be absent, and symptoms in other organ systems have been described.

Source - Wikipedia page

Below are two pictures, one is a normal intestine the other is one from a celiac sufferer. You can clearly see the difference. The Celiac endo shows scalloping of the folds and cracked-mud appearance of the mucosa. (Quote from the picture)


Normal Endo source


Celiac Endo source

In a nutshell those people who are diagnosed with this disease must adhere to a strict diet. One that removes all traces of wheat; i.e. breads and cereals but those are the obvious ones. You would be surprised how prevalent wheat is in our daily diets. Wheat can be found in medications, used for flavouring and used during the production of processed foods.

Living with 2 confirmed celiac sufferers it has been quite a chore. Not to mention expensive. Gluten free products are typically 20% more expensive than the gluten alternative.

I read a recent article in readers digest (March 2012 edition) about a possible vaccine. Australian scientists have stumbled upon a peptide that when administered to Celiacs sufferers will retrain the body to accept and process gluten. According to the article, a vaccine could be available as early as 2017.

I must apologize, i have thus far failed to locate an online version of the article but I will provide a link to the biotech company who has picked up the research.

ImmusanT

ImmusanT, according to their website is an American company located in Cambridge, MA. They have raised $20 Million to fund their research. They product they are developing is called Nexvax2 which is based on Peptide-based immunotherapy.

What is Peptide-based immunotherapy? Article here.

Nexvax2 will be administered in small frequent doses over two months and this would reprogram the body's response to gluten, this according to the readers digest article.

While I am doubtful that it will outright cure celiac, I do hope that it helps reduce the severity of a gluten attack.

Havoc

Links summary:
Wikipedia page for Celiac desease
Normal Endo source picture
Celiac Endo source picture
ImmusanT website
Peptide-based immunotherapy Article.

reply to post by LordHavoc


Thank you for the thread!! I have a dear friend who suffers from Celiac and I have forwarded her the information you provided so that she can follow it as well.

Interesting that this condition, like so many others, is on the rise. I hope that they can indeed come up with a simple solution to the problem.

Thanks for this man my mum is a serious sufferer from the desies and it is much appreshiated by me and here!! Star and flag!