The European Commission (EC) has approved MedImmune’s Fluenz Tetra intranasal four-strain live attenuated influenza vaccine for the prevention of flu in children aged 24 months to 18 years, parent company AstraZeneca has announced. Fluenz Tetra includes two strains of influenza A and two strains of influenza B; previous vaccines have contained only one strain of influenza B. Fluenz Tetra received a positive opinion from the EMA’s Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use (CHMP) in September, 2013.
The four-strain vaccine was approved by the FDA in February 2012 and is marketed in the US as FluMist Quadrivalent.
MedImmune VP of Clinical Biologics Infectious Disease and Vaccines Filip Dubovsky commented, “Fluenz Tetra represents the next generation of influenza vaccine and we are pleased that it is now approved in Europe. The inclusion of a second influenza B strain will broaden the coverage of Fluenz Tetra and should have a valuable public health impact.”
Read the AstraZeneca press release.
