The advent of the first genetically engineered vaccine, that for the hepatitis B virus, marked a new era in vaccine technology. But as more refined techniques of making vaccines replace the pioneering but crude methods of Jenner and Pasteur, the prospect of a world free of infectious diseases is still a distant one
SMALLPOX, eradicated more than 10 years ago by a mass vaccination programme, was a terrible disease. Those who caught it developed spots like flea-bites, which grew into pustules containing a transparent fluid which turned into a thick pus. The eyelids would swell and become glued together. Sufferers…
