Are We About To Have a Vaccine As A Cure For High Blood Pressure?

For many individuals suffering from high blood pressure the only long-term answer is daily pills and repeated monitoring from your physician with adjustments to your dose or changes in your tablets as needed. So just how much better would it be if you could simply be vaccinated against high blood pressure and forget about your daily tablets?

About 1 in 3 Americans are suffering from high blood pressure but, as a result of the complicated mix of tablets frequently needed for treatment, only about one third of these individuals in fact have got their blood pressure under control. Nevertheless, this could be about to change in the not too distant future.

In a trial carried out earlier this year 72 people (7 women and 65 men with an average age of 51 years 6 months) suffering from either mild or moderate high blood pressure were injected with a low dose (100 micrograms) vaccine, a high dose (300 micrograms) vaccine or a placebo. This process was repeated after four weeks and at the end of twelve weeks.

Two weeks after the last injection it was noted that the people given the high dose vaccine showed a fall in excess of 5 mm Hg in their higher systolic blood pressure and almost 3 mm Hg in their diastolic blood pressure reading.

Possible more notable, it was also found that the normal, and sometimes dangerous, spike in pressure that occurs in the morning between 5 am and 8 am was also lowered significantly by 25 mm Hg systolic and 13 mm Hg diastolic.

The people in the trial all tolerated the vaccine without difficulty and no safety issues arose during the course of the trial.

So just how does this vaccine work?

Presently blood pressure is controlled using several drugs that are designed to act on the body in different ways. Two of the types of drugs often used are angiotensin-converting enzyme (ACE) inhibitors (such as Lotensin, Altace, Prinivil, Monopril, Aceon, Accupril, Mavik, Vasotec, Capoten and Zestril) and angiotensin-2 (AT-2) receptor blockers (such as Atacand, Micardis, Avapro and Teveten). All of these drugs work by blocking the action of a molecule that causes the blood vessels to constrict and thus to raise the pressure within the blood vessels.

The vaccine used in the trial, which is known as CYT006-ANgQb, is designed to work in exactly the same way as these two existing drugs and so could clearly be an alternative for those people whose blood pressure is currently controlled with AT-2 receptor blockers or ACE inhibitors.

So what about those people whose pressure is being controlled using the alternatives of beta blockers (such as Sectral, Tenormin, Kerlone, Blocadren, Lopressor, Ziac, Cartol, Inderal, Corgard and Zebeta) or calcium channel blockers (such as Norvasc, Calan, Adalat, Plendil, Procardia, Isoptin, Tiazac, Sular, Vascor, Nimotop, Cardizem, Lotrel and Verelan)?

Of course, it is very early days yet and additional studies will be necessary before we see a vaccine in widespread use to treat high blood pressure. If the researchers are correct however it is likely that this vaccine will be effective for the majority of sufferers, regardless of the treatment currently being given.

Only time will tell, however this is undoubtedly an extremely encouraging development.

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