Tuberculosis vaccine

Tuberculosis [TB] is still one of the leading causes of death from a single infectious agent, killing 1.6 million people each year, mostly in developing countries. The existing vaccines, Bacille Calmette and Guerin [BCG], are efficient in preventing the most severe disseminated forms of disease in children and newborns, but its efficacy against active TB in adults has been challenged by several clinical studies. It is a common opinion that only the development of a new and more effective vaccine against TB would significantly ease the deadly disease. In recent years, looking for a new vaccine or an improved TB vaccine is urgently needed. Such vaccines include new live and attenuated strains of Mycobacterium tuberculosis, improved recombinant BCG strains, subunit and DNA vaccines

Distribution of ABO blood groups and Rhesus factor in Southwest Saudi Arabia

To document the distribution of the ABO and rhesus Rh blood groups in a random sample of Saudi students from the King Khalid University, Abha, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, and to compare our results from that of other studies in the Kingdom and elsewhere. The subjects included in this study were 944 males from thesouthwest region of Saudi Arabia including Aseer, Jizan, and Najran regions. The ABO blood groups and Rh factor from 944 Saudi males were determined. The frequency of ABO blood groups and Rh status were calculated separately. This study was carried out at King Khalid University, Abha, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, from January to March 2008, and the ethical approval was obtained from the Research Ethical Committee, College of Science, King Khalid University. The frequencies of ABO groups showed 56.8% for group O, 33.4% group A, 6% group B and 3.8% group AB trend. Only 7.2% of them were found to be Rh-negative. The frequencies of ABO and Rh phenotypes in the southwest population of Saudi Arabia are similar to those reported in most areas of the Arabian Gulf region