Nasal flu vaccine may not be recommended for use in US for years

ATLANTA — The road back to the nostrils of the nation’s children will likely take longer than the makers of the influenza vaccine FluMist would have liked.

And that, some observers worry, could put in jeopardy the future of the country’s only non-injectable flu vaccine, a product thought to be an important component of the response to future flu pandemics.

Once a darling of pediatricians and parents, the nasal mist vaccine was not recommended for use in the United States this winter because studies showed it offered limited protection in recent years.

On Wednesday, officials from MedImmune, the division of AstraZeneca that makes the vaccine, reported on their efforts to fix the vaccine during a meeting here of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, the expert panel that counsels the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on vaccine use.

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