Vaccinia immune globulin


Vaccinia immune globulin is made from the pooled blood of individuals who have been inoculated with the smallpox vaccine. The antibodies these individuals developed in response to the smallpox vaccine are removed and purified. This results in VIG. It can be administered intravenously. It is used to treat individuals who have developed progressive vaccinia after smallpox vaccination. It was also used along with cidofovir for the 2003 Midwest monkeypox outbreak as concomitant therapy to reduce the serious side effects of smallpox vaccine.

Adverse effects of smallpox vaccine

For a small percentage of the population, the smallpox vaccine either doesn't "take" or it produces adverse events. These include postvaccinial central nervous system disease, progressive vaccinia, eczema vaccinatum, accidental implantations, “generalized vaccinia,” and the common erythematous and/or urticarial rashes.

Development of immune globulin

In the late 1940s, Dr. Henry Kempe suggested that the solution to the complications of the smallpox vaccine was to provide antibodies in the form of gamma globulin. Kempe noted that for some infants, the smallpox vaccine failed to "take." Kempe believed this failure might be due to the high levels of maternal antibodies to vaccinia in the infants' blood. It appeared to Kempe, that the presence of the antibodies blocked viral replication and therefore a transfusion of antibodies from people who were immune due to vaccination, would help those in whom vaccination had failed.