{"id":173867,"date":"2017-11-30T13:29:46","date_gmt":"2017-11-30T18:29:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.liveaction.org\/news\/?p=173867"},"modified":"2017-11-30T11:25:32","modified_gmt":"2017-11-30T16:25:32","slug":"shingles-vaccine-babies-dont-die","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/shingles-vaccine-babies-dont-die\/","title":{"rendered":"New ethical shingles vaccine proves babies don’t have to die"},"content":{"rendered":"
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While some scientists claim they need aborted babies to develop and produce vaccines, vaccine researchers have just developed an FDA-approved shingles vaccine without the use of fetal cells.<\/p>\n

A recent story reveals that, despite the insistence that aborted fetal cells are necessary for vaccine development, a new shingles vaccine, Shingrix, has been developed by pharmaceutical giant, Glaxo SmithKline (GSK). The new vaccine was\u00a0created<\/a> from “Chinese hamster cells, unlike Merck\u2019s Zostavax which uses aborted fetal cells.” Until October, when the FDA approved it, people with the painful shingles virus either had to suffer through it or use Merck’s aborted fetal cell creation.<\/p>\n

This latest scientific innovation proves that fetal cell lines are absolutely not essential to combat diseases.\u00a0As the Associated Press reported last month<\/a>, this new vaccine is actually more effective than the current one made with fetal cells. The AP reports: “[I]t prevents shingles in about 90 percent of people. Merck\u2019s is about 50 percent effective.”<\/p>\n

But some vaccine researchers still insist that they need new aborted children for research because the “supply chain is dwindling” from the aborted fetal cell lines used to make common vaccines, such as Measles, Mumps and Rubella (MMR) and chickenpox.\u00a0(Chickenpox and shingles are related conditions, yet researchers are taking two different avenues to combat them. This is not uncommon in the ongoing conflict over ethical manufacturing of vaccines.)<\/p>\n

How a three month old fetus became a new cell line called Walvax-2<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n

Even some prolifers have agreed that since the aborted fetal cell lines were already in existence (and not created for the purpose of making a vaccine), at least some good came from the babies who died, though they would never condone the abortion itself. Focus on the Family<\/a> and the Catholic Church<\/a> make this argument, as they advise parents on making ethical vaccine decisions.<\/p>\n

But now Walvax-2 (Human diploid cell strains, or HDCSs), a new fetal cell line, is creating yet another ethical dilemma. Its development shows that aborted babies will continue to be used as research specimens in order to fight disease \u2014 at least until ethical vaccine development prevails.<\/p>\n

Walvax-2 was developed after researchers chose a three-month old preborn female baby out of nine available aborted children. Chinese researchers, Bo Ma and others, discuss the vaccine line’s development in their article<\/a>, \u201cCharacteristics and viral propagation properties of a new human diploid cell line, walvax-2, and its suitability as a candidate cell substrate for vaccine production.\u201d<\/p>\n

HDCSs have been considered ideal for vaccine development for years. Virtually every child vaccinated today has received a vaccine containing cell line\u00a0MRC-5<\/a> or WI-38.<\/p>\n