It is being anticipated by diabetes researchers that a vaccine which is almost 100-year-old used for preventing tuberculosis may be successful in undoing type 1 diabetes for patients.
FDA has approved a mid-stage trial for testing the vaccine known as bacillus Calmette-Guerin (BCG). This trial will be engaging 150 adults who are at an advanced stage of the type 1 diabetes.
Director of the Massachusetts General Hospital Immunobiology Laboratory in Boston and the primary researcher of the study, Dr. Denise Faustman have made announcements of the approval of the vaccine at the 75th Scientific Sessions of the American Diabetes Association.
American Diabetes Association says that that 5% of the patients suffering from diabetes have the type 1 and with such a health condition, the immune system attacks and then tears down insulin-producing beta cells in the pancreas of the patients.
The levels of a substance known as tumor necrosis factor or TNF is heaved up on a temporary basis by the BCG vaccine. The higher TNF levels are able to get rid of the damaging T cells in the blood of the ones suffering from type 1 diabetes, according to Faustman.
A small preliminary trial has also been conducted by Faustman and his team which demonstrated that the two BCG injections that had been given 4 weeks apart momentarily eradicated the T cells which are responsible for causing diabetes. The patients have also displayed indication of little and transitory return of insulin emission.
Faustman will be enrolling patients from 18 to 60 years of age as a part of the 5-year trial with small but measurable levels of insulin secretion from the pancreas. For the first year of the trial, the participants will be specified 2 injections, 4 weeks apart of BCG or placebo and then yearly injections for the upcoming 4 years.
