Clinical tolerance of methylene blue virus-inactivated plasma. A randomized crossover trial in 12 healthy human volunteers

Pathogen reduction of blood components during outbreaks of infectious diseases in the European Union: an expert opinion from the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control consultation meeting

Pathogen reduction (PR) of selected blood components is a technology that has been adopted in practice in various ways. Although they offer great advantages in improving the safety of the blood supply, these technologies have limitations which hinder their broader use, e.g. increased costs. In this context, the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC), in co-operation with the Italian National Blood Centre, organised an expert consultation meeting to discuss the potential role of pathogen reduction technologies (PRT) as a blood safety intervention during outbreaks of infectious diseases for which (in most cases) laboratory screening of blood donations is not available. The meeting brought together 26 experts and representatives of national competent authorities for blood from thirteen European Union and European Economic Area (EU/EEA) Member States (MS), Switzerland, the World Health Organization, the European Directorate for the Quality of Medicines and Health Care of the Council of Europe, the US Food and Drug Administration, and the ECDC. During the meeting, the current use of PRTs in the EU/EEA MS and Switzerland was verified, with particular reference to emerging infectious diseases (see Appendix). In this article, we also present expert discussions and a common view on the potential use of PRT as a part of both preparedness and response to threats posed to blood safety by outbreaks of infectious disease.

Proceedings of a Consensus Conference: pathogen inactivation-making decisions about new technologies

Significant progress has been made in reducing the risk of pathogen transmission to transfusion recipients. Nonetheless, there remains a continuing risk of transmission of viruses, bacteria, protozoa, and prions to recipients. These include many of the viruses for which specific screening tests exist as well as pathogens for which testing is currently not being done, including various species of bacteria, babesiosis, variant Creutzfeld-Jacob disease, hepatitis A virus, human herpes virus 8, chikungunya virus, Chagas disease, and malaria. Pathogen inactivation (PI) technologies potentially provide an additional way to protect the blood supply from emerging agents and also provide additional protection against both known and as-yet-unidentified agents. However, the impact of PI on product quality and recipient safety remains to be determined. The purpose of this consensus conference was to bring together international experts in an effort to consider the following issues with respect to PI: implementation criteria; licensing requirements; blood service and clinical issues; risk management issues; cost-benefit impact; and research requirements. These proceedings are provided to make available to the transfusion medicine community the considerable amount of important information presented at this consensus conference.

Extensive cross-reactivity of CD4+ adenovirus-specific T cells: implications for immunotherapy and gene therapy

Adenovirus (Ad)-specific T-cell responses in healthy adult donors were investigated. Ad5, inactivated by methylene blue plus visible light, induced proliferation and gamma interferon (IFN-gamma) production in peripheral blood mononuclear cells of the majority of donors. Responding T cells were CD4(+) and produced IFN-gamma upon restimulation with infectious Ad5 and Ads of different subgroups. T-cell clones showed distinct cross-reactivity patterns recognizing Ad serotypes from either one subgroup (C), two subgroups (B and C), or three subgroups (A, B, and C). This cross-reactivity of Ad-specific T cells has relevance both for Ad-based gene therapy protocols, as well as for the feasibility of T-cell-mediated adoptive immunotherapy in recipients of an allogeneic stem cell transplantation.