Prospects, including time-frames, for improved foot and mouth disease vaccines

Inactivated foot and mouth disease (FMD) vaccines have been used successfully as part of eradication programmes. However, there are a number of concerns with the use of such vaccines and the recent outbreaks of FMD in disease-free countries have increased the need for improved FMD control strategies. To address this requirement, new generation FMD vaccines are being developed. Currently, one of the most promising of these vaccine candidates utilises an empty viral capsid subunit delivered to animals by a live virus vector. This candidate, a replication-defective recombinant human adenovirus containing the capsid and 3C proteinase coding regions of FMD virus (FMDV), induces an FMDV-specific neutralising antibody response in inoculated animals. Upon challenge with a virulent animal-passaged homologous virus, swine and cattle vaccinated with this recombinant adenovirus are protected from clinical signs of FMD as well as from FMDV replication. One inoculation of a high dose of this vaccine candidate protected swine from challenge as early as seven days after vaccination.