14th Annual Barouch Lab Retreat, January 2025

/in

Three months into 2025, US measles cases surpass total for 2024

/in

“As I’m seeing this outbreak unfold, it brings me back to the year 2000 when the United States declared that measles was eradicated from our country,” said Dr. Dan Barouch, director of the Center for Virology and Vaccine Research at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center.

“The split screen of what’s happening now and the fact that it was deemed to be eradicated 25 years ago, I think highlights the deterioration of proven preventative measures,” he said. “And the current outbreak might be larger than we currently realize.” Read Full Article

BGBoston Globe

‘Short Sighted’: What Canceled FDA Meetings And WHO Withdrawal Mean For Fall Flu Vaccines

/in

“If you want a vaccine available for the fall, the strains included have to be decided by springtime,” said Dr. Dan Barouch, director of the Center for Virology and Vaccine Research at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, adding that the meeting’s cancellation is a “clear departure from prior practice.”

The FDA has used advisory committees for the evaluation of drugs since the 1960s. Barouch said that even though the FDA has internal staff that could make these decisions by themselves, it’s important to have external input, especially from academics.

“It brings external experts from around the country, as well as an opportunity for debate and public comment,” he said. Read Full Article…

CDC Investigating Hospitalizations Of Five People Who Recently Received Chikungunya Vaccine

/in

Chikungunya-like reactions included “fever, joint pain, headache, rash, and can also include cardiac and neurologic conditions which were serious in two cases,” Dr. Dan Barouch, director of the Center for Virology and Vaccine Research at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, (not involved in the clinical studies).

“The robust vaccine safety surveillance system often identifies extremely rare adverse effects of vaccines after approval,” said Barouch, an infectious disease expert not involved in the CDC investigation. Read Full Article…

‘Patients are very sick’: Flu cases peaking in Massachusetts, rest of country

/in

“There is some optimism that it might actually be peaking now, so our hope is that it will get better over the coming weeks,” said Dr. Dan Barouch, of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center.

However, that doesn’t mean cases won’t continue for months to come. Read Full Article…

BGBoston Globe

During COVID, vaccines were the path to ‘herd immunity.’ Now, a growing number don’t want to be part of the herd.

/in

A third vaccine, sold by Johnson & Johnson, was based on science from the Center for Virology and Vaccine Research at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston. Dr. Dan Barouch said Operation Warp Speed offers two lessons in preparing for the next pandemic.

“We learned that the rapid development, the rapid testing, and the rapid approval of vaccines in the face of a raging pandemic is possible, and provides inspiration for the future,” Barouch said. “However, we also learned that the sociopolitical climate and public acceptance of the vaccines is absolutely critical for the vaccines to work.” Read Full Article…

WBUR

Flu cases tick up across the country: What you need to know

/in

“The flu vaccine is about 40% to 60% protective,” says  Dr. Dan Barouch, a professor of medicine at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Harvard Medical School. “It’s not a vaccine that gives complete protection against the flu, but it does substantially improve outcomes from the flu, particularly severe outcomes.”

Is there anything you want people to know about the flu that they may not be able to find right now through the government?

“ Information is really important. And information about the winter respiratory viruses changes every week. It spikes, it goes up, it goes down. So accurate and timely information is really important. Flu has caused an estimated 20 million cases this season so far, a quarter of a million hospitalizations and about 10,000 deaths. So flu is definitely surging. It was relatively quiet during the pandemic and now it’s clearly made a comeback.” Read Full Article

NIH Communications Freeze Leaves Longwood Affiliates Out in the Cold

/in

Funding for the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center lab run by HMS professor Dan H. Barouch ’93, which researches vaccine development, has not been interrupted. But Barouch’s collaboration with groups in Africa on HIV research has been halted due to a stop-work order from the U.S. Agency for International Development. Read Full Article…

RFK Jr.’s step-by-step blueprint to question the safety of vaccines

/in

Dan Barouch, the director of the Center for Virology and Vaccine Research at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, said he agrees that vaccine safety is of paramount  importance, and that the perception of safety is also important in a time of declining trust.

“There’s a very rigorous vaccine safety process in place, and vaccines are very safe, but nothing is 100% safe. There isn’t a single drug or vaccine that is truly 100% safe. So it’s critical for us to understand and to study and to honestly discuss adverse events to vaccines,” Barouch said.

GBH

With virus cases surging, Boston hospitals adopt more strict masking policies

/in

Respiratory viruses tend to spike in the winter for several reasons, says Dr. Dan Barouch, director of the Center for Virology and Vaccine Research at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center.

“First, with the winter weather, people tend to congregate indoors,” Barouch said. “A second reason is that for the holidays, people tend to travel and have larger groupings. And thirdly, people are taking far fewer precautions now than they did in prior years because we’re out of the pandemic phase for COVID. So really, for all three reasons, we’re seeing a predictable surge now.”

That surge shouldn’t cause too much anxiety, Barouch said.

“It’s a reason for people to take intelligent precautions, perhaps more so for people who are more vulnerable,” Barouch said. “I don’t think that this is a cause of alarm, but I do think it’s a cause for vigilance.” Read more…