Winter Viruses and How to Beat Them

Every year millions of us are infected by winter virus, colds and

flu and stomach bugs like norovirus, which this year has hit early and

hard. Hundreds of hospital wards have been closed and if you are one

of the million or so affected you know just how unpleasant it can be.

In this programme we will be investigating how viruses wreak

havoc, and Micheal will be suffering in the name of science to

explain runny noses. What do we know about the viruses and how

vulnerable are people like the young, elderly and pregnant women

like me. What can we do to protect ourselves which are normally

routine illnesses. We have been tracking down where this year's

viruses are most active. Examining how they spread and hunting them

with thermal technology. We set up a little pop-up clinic over there.

It is within a stone's throw from some of London's leading reseven

centres and hospitals. And experts from those places will be coming

Welcome to our pop up lab and studio. We're surrounded which

London's medical research institutions but this is the heart

of a thriving residential area. About a hundred thousand people

come to work within a half-mile radius of where we are. Believe it

or not, seven million people visit this shopping centre every year.

With so many people around it is the perfect place for kolds, flu

and norovirus to spread. Now some of them today will be walking

around carrying winter flu viruses. But just how many of them? During

winter it is estimated an average 100,000 people a day come down with

influenza or flu. The most dangerous of the viruses, which are

circulating. We will be inviting everyone who passes our door to

come in and be tested for flu. will be reporting on interesting

new research into man flu, which will hopefully settle a few

arguments. Amongst the first people through the door are a family

recovering from a norovirus infection. Hello, do you remember

what it was like? I was sick in my room on the floor and all down the

stairs and on the walls. Oh blimey, you really did suffer isn't you?

didn't know what to do because she was feeling so poorly The norovirus

is certainly grabing headlines this year, but there are plenty of cold

and flu viruses circulating as well. This professor is one of the

country's leading virologists, she's got the latest details on

this year's winter virus activity in the UK. We have more and more

people arriving to be tested, now what is the situation looking like

across the UK with the winter viruss? There's plenty of viruses

out there. If we have a look at the map of the UK, the virus most

people will have heard of is norovirus, and there's lots of that

about, particularly in two regions of the UK, the North-East of

England and south-west of laenged. There we've had more ward closures

in the hospitals than in any other part of England. What about other

viruses flu for instance? There's plenty of flu out there, we have

flu virus in the south of England, and also a lot of laboratory

confirmed caseness the north of England as well. These are the lab

confirmed cases, what about information were GPs? We also

collect information about which regions of the country people are

going to air GPs and reporting typical symptoms of flu, the coughs,

and fevers and axe and pains. There, we've got a lot of those symptoms

coming in from Northern Ireland, Wales and West Midlands. Right now

there's the area of the UK that is feeling the full impact of the

virus. What about Respiratory Syncytial Virus, it's a common

virus, but it can be serious in young children, have you

information about that? That is nasty in children, it can cause

bronchial problems. RSV was around in the winter this year, we peaked

out in December, it is on the decline but we are still keeping an

eye on it. Millions of us come down with some form of viral infection

every winter. Usually it is just an unpleasant inconvenience, but

sometimes it can be much more serious.

I've come to the university hospital of Wales to find out what

they're doing to try and combat the apparently remorseless advance of

dangerous winter viruses. The nszness is on high alert of a

winter when vulnerable people like the old and very young suffer

complications from viral infections. Here in the children's ward the

hospital is experiencing a surge in RSV. There's no vaccine against it

and no effective medicine. Hello there. How is he doing? He is fine

thank you. Who is this? This is Tigh four weeks old and was

admitted yesterday, he has Bronx kite tus, in small babies they

present with coughing, breathlessness, fast rapid

breathing and often what brings someone to hospital is they're not

able to feed properly. He is breathing rapidly at the moment,

isn't sne Yes.. How do you treat? Unfortunately there's no specific

viral treatment. Giving him extra oxygen, and also, helping him with

his feeds, if he isn't able to take a bottle, we put a tube in his nose

and give him milk in his stomach that way. Not disturbing them is

the best way. RSV piqueed in December, with a lot of children

under one. There's usually an epidemic every year, but this year

we're seeing a lot. You have no idea whether you'll continue to see

a lot or not? No every year was different. When I was a child efpb

had measles, I hope one day we'll are vaccines against things like

that. But at the moment, lots more work to do in the labs. There may

not be a cure for RSV. But there is a defence, early warning hospital

labs, including Cardiff. Dr Catherine Moore is based in the

hospital. What is happening? We are seeing a lot of norovirus which is

unusual because the levels are higher than they have been in

previous win ders. So there's lots of norovirus testing going on. It

tends to close downwards and you have problems in nursing homes. So

knowing it is circulating and how much the virus is circulating and

whether you can reopen wards, for example is it important, so we're

testing for that at the minute. Cardiff is one of the UK's centre

hospitals, gathering data about outbreaks across the country.

we've done across the UK is we have a network of GPs and surgeries, who

will take swabs and what they do is send them to us, and we'll look to

see what the viruss are in the community, which the patients are

going to their GP for. We do all this now through real time

techniques, so we're more rapid and we get test requests because we're

able to offer the clinician a faster result than we used to.

with all viruses a rapid diagnosis, helps with control. I find it

exciting. It is the molecular revolution in biology. Helicopters

like Cardiff use state-of-the-art equipment. But how might you be

able to tell if you have something more serious than a cold. The local

pharmacist is telling us that she's seeing a lot of people coming in,

who say "I got the flu" but she thinks they have a cold. How do you

tell the difference. Let me show you using this, which is a they

were graphic camera and brave volunteer, Rachel here. I'm going

to show you, now if you look there, can you see yourself, not the most

flattering picture. The white bit is your skin temperature, which is

hot, about 36.5. Your nose is bright purple, which, yeah,

suggests it is around 32 degrees. The common cold virus, likes the

cool, it will confine itself to the nose, but the influenza virus are

tougher, and can go to core temperatures, and infect your lungs,

and that will make you feel ill. The main thing you can tell if you

have a cold or flu is taking your temperature, if above 38 degrees,

you have the flu, below that you probably got a cold. Thank you very

much. 6 Some countries are now using

thermal cameras in airports to detect passengers with fevers.

We're using the same idea to find people who will bring into our lab,

for a more scientific swab test. The dip stick detects anyone infect

with the this year's most common types of flu. We talked a little

bit about how viruses affect us but what is it? Virus is a tiny

microbiology enterities, they are in the family of my cobs, the

bacteria are the fungi, but they are the smallest of all of those.

Viruses are so small, we measure them in nanometres which is a

thousand of a thousandth of a millimetre. If you think of my

thumb nail of a centimetre across, if I lined up a bunch of flu

viruses along the thumb nail, I could get 100,000 viruses, if we

look at the lovely model we have. lovely glass model? It is very easy

to explain what a virus is using this model. What you can see inside

is the genetic material, the whole point of a virus is maintain this

genetic material, to be able to replicate it in a cell host and

make more of it. Unlike many bacteria, viruses can't multiply or

survive without a living creature. But they've evolved clever ways of

using host cells. The spikes on the outside of this virus are proteins,

which act like keys. By finding a natural lock on the surface of a

host cell, which matches its keys the virus can trick itself in. Once

inside the cell the virus bursts and releases the genetic material

in its core which holds information for making new viruses. In genetic

material enters the cell's nucleus and high jacks its machinery,

coning it into making thousands of new viruses instead. The cell fills

with virus particles until it ruptures and army of dup plicate

viruses marches out and the process begins againful There seems to be a

range of effect that these viruses wreak upon us? Yes. When he get

influenza or cold virus we have a mild disease, it is unpleasant and

inconvenient but in two or three days we're feeling better and we

can get back to normal life. But for some people it can lead to

something more serious, hospital sedation or even fatality.

So how does the body react to fight off the invasion of a virus?

nose is a gateway to the body but one of the first lines of defence.

We're going to look at the differences of a nasal cafity of a

healthy person and that of a virus sufferer.

Here we have a ear nose and throat surgeon, he is based at University

College Hospital but he is here today to look at some hopefully

normal nasal passages. I'm going to look in your nose. So, just in the

right nostril, the first thing you see when you go in there, to the

right, you see the septum. This is looking nicely? Pale pink, you

can't see mousse cuss around. There's no is not in there. It is

wonderful living anatomy thank you very much. The lining of a healthy

nasal cafity is pink with clean open passages which the air can

move freely. But what about the one fighting a winter virus. This is

Philip who kindly offered his nose this afternoon. Philip thinks he's

got a cold. He has had a sore throat and sniffle for the last

couple of days. Gooey things are looking different in Philip's nose.

Very congested, this is the left side. Things look far more moist.

You see elements of pussy material, you see the top left there. That's

foul. When you say mucus, that's is not. It is made by cells in the

lining of the nasal caf vit, it helps trap particles and keep them

out of the lungs. What about blowing noses is that a good

instinction? It allows you to breathe better, but doesn't

actually shorten the life span of the infection. It is systematic.

makes you feel more comfortable. Unlike Micheal's pink lining,

Philip's is red and puffy and same Right, are you OK. We're just gone

to the back of your nose now, 10 centimetre in. You can see on the

right there, it is red and inflameed there, as opposed to the

left. Do you feel like you have a sore throat. You can see the mucus

hanging around, see that material? You can see it dripping down the

back wall. That's come from the nose, that's inflamed. What causes

this inflammation, when you get a cold? It is an immune response, you

get white cells move in and it is part of the body's defence against

it. It looks pinker, because you have the wider blood vessels

bringing the blood in the area. Do you think we ought to let Philip go.

Thank you. You should have a round Viruss are clever, they high jeck

our cellar machinery, tricking cells making into most of their

cells. They help you see spread things to another people. It

irritates our noses and throat, so we cough and snees, forcing the

virus-containing droplets. Can we We gave passing volunteers,

tweezers, pepper and other things to tickle the nose. We found it is

hard to cause a sneeze. It is not something our bodies do often,

which proves how clever viruses are. But eventually... We saw droplets

fly. Apparently the average cold sufferer's sneeze spreads more than

a metre and holds around 100,000 virus particles. Multiply that by

all the sufferers around the country, and you have trillions of

viruses spread around. Respiratory viruses spread around via coughs

and sneezes but viruses that effect our guts have to be transmitted by

something altogether more violent I've come to Derbyshire on a

bitterly cold morning to visit the health and safety laboratory, which

is just down there and to meet vomiting Larry, more of the unusual

weapons we have against one of Britain's commonest winter

illnesses norovirus. This winter there have been over 70% more cases

of this vomiting bug than last year. Temperature and headache hit within

12 hours of infection, often with projeck tile vomiting. Up to eight

million of us are carrying this virus at any time. What it does is

hijacks the body's normal mechanisms T infects the small

intestine, and makes you produce profuse vom hit and die rea. Why

would a virus do that, then it gets out tht world, infects in other

people and gets to live and thrive. Vomiting Larry has been designed to

investigate the spread of norovirus. It is hoped it will control the

infection in hospital wards across the country. Hi Catherine. Now I

know one of the characteristics of norovirus is you get the projeck

tile vomiting, what's the mechanism? You don't get the

retching, so you can be stood up with you have an inhalation of

breath, and collectively all the abdominal muscles push together to

increase pressure, which forces the fluid out of the mouth. And then

you go like that. Just like that. This is what Larry does You have

fluid in here and pisson push it is up and out of Larry's mouth.

would love Larry in action. You may People with this virus, they have

seconds to react. The liquid contains water with a marker, so

that when we turn the lights off and put UV lights on, we can see

how far it travelled and see the smallest splashes. Time to turn out

Vomiting spreads far more virus than either a cough or sneeze. Each

time you throw up about a billion norovirus particles are released.

Here, under UV lights we can see how far this virus can travel. The

floor is divided into squares of 0 Kent metres, showing the vomit has

spread three metres, forwards and sideways. That was impressive, he

lived up to his name, he spewed out. We will turn on normal lights and

clean up the mess and afterwards, we'll turn the UV light back on and

Anyone cleaning up norovirus vomit or being near somebody sick, risks

infection by picking up the virus on their hands. It can be inhaled,

tiny particles are stirred up as you clean. I think I've done a

reasonable job. If I've missed anything, it means live virus would

be left lying around, waiting to re-infected. I can't see obvious

stuff, but let's turn off the lights and we'll see. Oh not so

good. There's droplets there, I did not see. One of the droplets there,

a few million viruses in it? Potentially, yes. How long would

they five for? Potentially for 12 days. Impressive. What about me? I

can't see anything on me. I will wash my hands. Definitely

contaminated, Micheal. There's a lot on your hand. I can see equally,

if you got it on your hand, you're likely to stick them in your mouth

at some point. I think I'll have to get washed up.

I can appreciate now, just how far virus particles can spread. And how

challenging cleaning up can be. Norovirus is really good at

spreading itself around and once it's in place, it is almost

impossible to kill. All you can do if you meet somebody who is

infected, is wash your hands again, and again, and there is no point in

using alcohol wipes. Because Professor Ian, studies the

neurobiology on the norovirus and expert on its spread. Your research

is on norovirus and it is in the headlines a lot this year, why has

it been so bad? Well, this year's been a particularly unusual year

for norovirus activity. What we found is the virus appears to be

circulating more. What you can see here on the graph, you can see last

year, we didn't see ain crease in activity until November. This year,

we saw an increase in activity in October. Right back there, yeah.

This massive peak in December, it is coming down, is that real?

difficult to say at this time of year. Over the Christmas period,

you find a lot less cases reported, but it will increase. What do you

think why it seems to be getting worse this year? One of the reasons

is there's a new virus identified, and this was found in Sydney in

2012, it is found in Sydney Australia, and in it is spread

worldwide, it is mutateed it is not recognised by people's immune

system which means it is susceptible. It is a nasty virus,

what can everybody do it protect themselves? It is difficult one. It

is clear, good hygiene is important. You need to be careful making sure

your hands are washed properly. People don't wash their hands long

enough, so make sure you do that. If you know you have the virus,

show responsibility, so if you are infectious, don't go to work, don't

send your children to school. This would limit norovirus outbreaks.

Winter viruses thrive when we're huddled together coughing and

sneezing over each other, and they persist longer outside the body in

the cold, so they have a better chance to spreading from one host

to another. How do they get inside our bodies, that's through the our

faces our mouths, nostrils and tear ducts. If you pick up a virus on

your hand and then touch your face, We all do it, so what can we do to

stop ourselves? In a number of other countries, you see on the

public transport system wearing these. Now I've always been cynical

as to whether this does any good but it turns out it does. You're

probably thinking I put this on and that blocks the viruses from

getting into your nose, it doesn't do that at all. What happens is

when you wear one of these, when you have the virus on the fingertip,

you don't shove it up your nose. Can I persuade busy commuters, to

have a new friend. Fancy a face mask? Would you like a face mask?

No. Now surely you're interested? No. I would guess that about 30

people have gone past and not a single taker. Can I persuade

anybody, face mask? Well London commuters are not interested in

trying to stop viruses spreading around. But if this crowd was hard

then there's less chance with the They may look adorable but young

children are a health hazard. They get six to eight colds every year,

twice as many as an adult and share them around. They're a primary

driver of infection, in had our community. Why is that? I've come

to a primary school in Bristol to meet up virologist professionor,

and together we're going to do an experiment to show that viruses

love children. This professor is using a gel with particles, to see

if one child had brought the infection in skoofplt which

watching how the gel is moving around, we should see how viruses

are transferred. Normally invisible this gel can only be seen under UV

light. So this is to mimic a sneeze. You get a define spray, the

particles, are small, that's exactly what we want. It should be

mimicking how a virus will move around. Once we're finished we will

see where the material has gone and who it's gone on to. Are you

confident? I'm sure. I'm sure the children won't disappoint. Look at

What we've done in the classroom is to seat two or three specific areas.

We've seated this desk here with spray and gel. And here in the same

way. In this area here where the children keep some play things,

toys, and various things we'll expect they'll be using later in

the day. Andrew and I will watch the children on a monitor as they

go about their daily routine. Schoolchildren are key spreaders of

infection, partly because they're so vulnerable to illnesses. Very

young children have immature immune system so they can't fight off

infections as easily as they can when they're older, so there's

opportunity for viruses to get in and replicate efficiently. They can

replicate themselves when they touch mouths, eyes and noses, all

primary infection routes for respiratory viruses. If one chews

the end of a pen and share it, and the other person will chew it, or

move it around their face, then actually you can see social contact

the properly They're so close. long will viruses survive on

something like that? That fabric up to eight hours. Which is a long

time. She looks so innocent, doesn't she. We saw you. There we

go, a good one. Throughout the day we've seen the

gel to represent what would happen if an infected child was sneezing

or coughing. Children are very tact tile they like to touch and feel

things a lot and touch each other frequently. They don't feel the

same social pressures. They're not as inhicted as adults are. They

interact in large social groups and they're tact tile when they do so.

You have one touching her face there. They touch their faces and

noses and eyes, frequently. It is astonishing, when you think about

it. You can see there. Wipeed his nose and then he might put that

down, some other kid will pick it up. There we go, he hand it had to

another child. We can hear coughs and sneezes as we're here, and they

will be spreading infection. can appreciate when you look at the

scenarios, it is impossible to control? Completely. Apart from

giving them their own Lego set, there's nothing much you can do?

That's right. Viruses are very successful. They have found all the

opportunities. For six hours the And at the end of the school day,

we black out the windows to see how much of the classroom has been

contaminated. Here we are in the crime scene, and

the major criminals have fled. What do you see here then? First, very

obvious thing is that we don't have much of droplet spray left. We have

smeared surface here. You can see smears on the paper and marks on

the table here, where we didn't have any material. We sprayed some

of the toys. This one, I think we can see immediately. Viruses like

the plastic surface? That's right. This hard non-absorbant material,

they'll exist in a viable state for sometime. If we look at some of

this, it is not droplets, it is snaered so children have been

playing with this, it is now on me. It is infectious little thing.

is on both sides, that's true for, yeah, there we go. It shows how

easily it is for the stuff to be spread around. It is not just a

classroom that is covered in our virus gel.

We welcome the children back for our reveal. They're wearing glasses

to protect them from the UV lights. We will see how much spray you will

spread around here. It doesn't do anything to you. We will do the

countdown, five, four, three, two, You've got around the nose. I have

it all over my scarf. Even teach chaers get it. It is basically got

everywhere. You see it up the nose, on the face. I think it's worked

very well, probably too well. This little girl here has got it

That was Kay on theic, but it was dramatic, I have to say. The things

I noticed was they got it all over themselves, face, hair noses, what

did you get from it? We tried to mimic situations that it was one

child that was infected, so at the end there was self-children who had

picked up this material, so it demonstrates the spread is very

efficient and effective. And now, they're going to go out there in

the community back to their loving families and take virus with them?

And anyone else they come across. Wendy, it seems children are

incredibly important when it comes to spreading viruses? Pandemic of

2009, we have good evidence how good children were in spreading the

outbreak. We had the virus introduced to us in early

springtime. The numbers of people getting sick went up and up steeply,

during the early part of the summer. Then all of a sudden there was a

decline in case numbers, that absolutely coincided with the

school holidays when all the children went home and stopped

mixing up their viruses. In September the numbers start rising

again as they come back to school. Here at our popup studio there's a

constant queue of people want ago flu test, but so far no-one has

tested positive. We've found a string of common colds. However

this gentleman has just come back from the United States, and he's

feeling terrible, under the weather, he's reporting what sounds like

flu-like symptoms. Fever, chills, nose. Generally feeling poorly.

There are two main types of flu virus, A and B. Having swabed the

nostrils, it takes ten minutes to get the answer. Here are our result,

there's a pink line, which actually indicates to us you have some

antigens present of influenza A. So you flight have. That's a surprise.

Which is probably why you're feeling unwell. Best advice is rest,

lots of fluids, and if you're still feeling poorly, go and see your GP.

Thank you very much. Andrew probably picked up the infection in

the United States, where he was suffering a major outbreak of this

type of flu. We take the fight against flu seriously, because it

can have devastating consequences. The Spanish flu pandemic in 1918

affected 30% of the world's population and killed 50 million

people. Three pan democratics followed, the Asian flu caused two

million deaths, a decade later, Hong Kong flu killed an estimated

one million people. The last major pandemic, swine flu, emerged in

Mexico in 2009 and spread around the world. Swine flu is in 74

countries. In the last week the number of cases tripled to over 100.

In this country... By the time the pandemic had run its course, it

affected one billion people and killed 300,000. Why was swine flu

so widespread, what was it about it that made it take off? It was a

pandemic and new virus that came in from an animal source and nobody

was immune before that time so it was quicker to spread from person

to person. We estimate that at least half of us actually caught

swine flu in 2009 or 2010. It seems extraordinary that half of us in

the UK had the infection? In some regions higher, up to 70% of people

in London or Birmingham were carrying antibodies by the spring

of 2010. Flu is potentially dangerous because it regularly

makes jumps from animals into humans. And when that happens we're

extremely vulnerable to mass infections. Micheal's been to

Surrey to find out more. This is the governance animal and health

veterinary laboratory, where this they monitor farm animals of

diseases which could spread to humans. Hi Ian. What's the link

with winter viruses. The ries Vlore reservoir is in birds, they're

efficient hosts in which it reached a balance of the host and doesn't

cause indue effect on the bird but it producesds a large amount of

viruses. Flu viruses can pass from wild birds to farm birds, and other

to animals. Anything that contains contaminated faeces, they can get

into a pig barn, either through someone's footwear or contaminated

water, can introduce the virus. Pigs get flu the same as us. They

get respiratory infection and get sick and have a fever, so no

differences. They take to bed and demand Lib Dem ship. You give them

warm beding and keep them nice. Viruses from infected birds and

pigs can be transferred to humans the same way we catch flu from each

other. Through sneezes and infected droplets. That jump is a relevantly

rare event, it is not that easy moved from a pig to a human.

same thing if I sneeze on the pig. The virus with the pandemic, spread

to pigs through contacted people. The reason the new bird and swine

flus are so dangerous to humans is that we have no resistance to them.

An outbreak could infect millions of us and be lethal. Ian's

laboratory is our first line of defence.

They're constantly on guard, ready to sound the alarm at the first

sound of danger. They get samples of anything suspicious from farms

around the country. The first thing we have to do is make a liquid

extract and take that liquid preparation and we inject it in an

egg. We use these because they're good environment for growing the

virus, they're rich in cell types to grow the virus, and then can he

with look the virus and analyse it and look at the chrkstx. What

happens if you see something nasty? If it is a outbreak from UK poultry,

it means there will be a immediate response at Government level to

control the outbreak, there's stages to limit and protect UK

livestock sector and public health. His lab is one of many monitoring

animals for new outbreaks. Where are the hot spots at the moment

Wherever you have large number of people, pigs and poultry, reared in

an outdoor system, there's greater likelihood the virus can move

between different populations. That's south-east Asia.

particularly Asia? It is mainly because we have a system where they

produce birds and trade and market them in a way that's never been

seen before. So, we have frenzied activity in the markets, people are

coming and going with birds, moving birds in different vehicles, a lot

of contact with the people and birds, so these are perfect

environments for spreading perpetuateing virus. How would it

get from China here? With global travel, if you are talking with

human contact, a person can jump on a plane and be on the other side of

the world in no time. Where do you think the next influenza outbreak

will come from? It may not come out of a pig, a bird, or could happen

in a human as well. We don't know what the pathways, but we know

there is more than one pathway. won't shake your hand, I may go and

wash them. Thank you very much. There's no sign of any dangerous

new flu strains this winter. But more familiar strains are making

their presence felt. Wendy what do we know about the way flu is

affecting us in the UK this year? Data collected by the Health

Protection Agency, shows us that flu season kicked off on December

17th this year, which is a late start. Every flu season is

different, but that's late for it to get going. How can you say the

season kicked off? That's when we see numbers confirmed in the

laboratory, people go to GPs and in hospital with flu-like symptoms are

infected with the virus. As usual, we Ceylon lone is the hot spot,

early warning signal, place where the virus is establishing first and

spreading out to the kest of the country. That's because of the

denseity of people? Much more likely to bump into a person with

the virus in the city. In the south of England, there's more of the

influenza type B virus, causing flu illness, in the north of England,

we have predominance of type A virus. What are the differences

between the two types of virus? Well they're both influenza viruses

and look very similar, but one important difference between them

is that influenza B virus is a virus which infects only humans,

which A can infect animals and people. That's the reason why when

we get pandemics, it is always A, because it is when we have a jump

from animals into humans, causing a new outbreak. Is this a pattern

that happens again and again, flu in animals to flu in humans and

that produces a pandemic, massive outbreak but returns as a winter

epidemic? Absolutely. The influenza A virus, the H3N2 virus, causing

the Hong Kong flu, but it is with us, coming back year on year in an

altered form. One step ahead of the antibody response and still

managing to circulate in people. Although viruses are constantly

changing, we too have a trick up our sleeve. We and our ancestors

have been fighting viruses for millions of years, so our immune

systems are well evolved to cope. When a virus enters the body the

first line of defence involves special proteins which recognise

the invadeers and mount an attack, with weapons like our own anti-

viral chemicals as well as raising the body's temperature giving us a

fever. The next line of defence involves a special type of white

blood cell which produces antibodies. Antibodies recognise

specific surface markings on viruses and mount a targeted attack

on that virus. Once antibody- producing cells have been

activevated they stick around as memory cells. You now have

immuneity, you're prearmed if the same virus attacks you again. Now

the swab test we're doing here tests for virus itself. But how do

we know if we're immune? How do we know if we've got antibodies? We

know that the memory cells produces antibodies endure. They continue to

give us immunity to infection. Micheal has gone to meet Professor

John Oxx Ford to see what he can learn about his own antibodies.

John will test Micheal's bloods for the presence of specific antibodies

to this season's flu strains. We've got blood from you before

Christmas and after Christmas, if you've been infected, heaven's

forbid, during the Christmas time, we will pick up an increase in

antibody. You should tell, over the period when I thought I was having

a hangover, I had flu? Yes.. If you have been infected over the last

weeks, we will see increase in antibodies to one particular virus.

So this actually holds the antibodies pretty well to every

infection I've had? Yes. We've taken your serum here. Now what

we're going to do is add virus to this plate. So the moment of truth.

It is all to do with the number and precise type of antibodies in my

blood. If I don't have antibodies to this year's flu the Wells will

remain pink, look they are. Do you want to read your own

results? I would have said on the basis of this, I haven't had the

flu this Christmas. I would agree with it. - you. It looks like I

wasn't infected with flu over Christmas? What if I did have the

antibodies, what protection could they provide? So imagine last year

I got the flu, I went through all that, I recovered, this year the

same flu virus is circulating, I get exposed to it again? You're in

a happy situation, you are fully prepared, you got antibodies, they

will be floating around and immediately they see your virus

they will latch on it, they'll stiffen on the outside so

immobilise the virus, you won't recognise you are infected. This is

what happens with most virus infections. A few hours, the battle

takes place and you weren't aware you were exposed? Yeah. The body

producesds antibodies in response to be infected with the virus, and

this is also the way that vaccination works. If we can show

the body a virus, or even just a part of a virus, then we can

elitity the same antibody response. Vaccines are very powerful weapons

in our battle with viruses. Flu vaccines are made from fragments of

viruses which trick our immune systems into reacting as if they

are under attack. The result is that we get all the

antibody protection we need w but none of the pain.

So how do you turn a virus into a vaccine? Let's go in the cell

culture lab here and I have a virus. I get this ugly thing is the virus.

Are viruses really this big? This is hike billions of times bigger

than the flu. To a flu, you get 10,000 of them on a pin's head.

do you equate a vaccine against something like this? It is not so

difficult to make a vaix serene, you split the protein. The green,

is called H and then there's this which is N, you cut them off the

virus. Once the virus spikes are cut off, they are progressed and

used to make the vaccine. Because they are dead they can't make you

ill but trigger the immune system to produce antibodies, giving

immunity to that particular virus. So basically, when you get a

vaccine it is that put in your arm. The challenge is making sure the

vaccine produces the correct antibodies to deal with the ever-

changing flu virus. We react to infections slightly differently.

There are genetic differences between us, which mean some of us

may be more easily infected than others, or might even be better

spreaders of viruses. Professor bill studies genetics at the

University of Cambridge. I'm intrigued to learn with the

neurovirus, there's seems to be a certain part of the population that

are naturally resistant to it? That's a genetic thing where you

inherit a gene from your parents which mean the virus can't infect

you. There are a number of genetic susceptibilities coming to light

now, going back to the swine flu pandemic which a massive natural

experiment on the human race, we can use all the new techniques of

sequenceing people's gee gnomes and see the difference of people who

ended up in hospital and those who just got mild colds.

So if our against with determine how badly we're affected by a virus,

could there be some truth to the idea that men get flu worst than

women. That man flu is real? From a evolutionary point of view, might

it make sense that males and at the males respond differently to

infections? It does, evolution is fantastically good at fine-tuning

the system in order to make the best of the resources. You can

imagine men and women do things differently, they have different

time budgets and energy budgets and therefore you can imagine them

putting different amounts into fighting infection. And maybe

fighting infection in different ways. The other thing that affects

how you feel is your immune system and that could well be different,

depending whether you are a man or woman because you are other things

affecting that like hormones, and we know hormones and stress can

play different outcomes in disease. Is there a difference between the

way men and women respond, interact with viruss? My models come from

animals, a and a good example is the red deer, where you have the

males, have one chance of reproducing in the season and they

have to try corner as many at the males as they can and mate with

lots of demales and only the biggest males in the best condition

can do that. If they get a disease, the mating season they want to get

rid of that as fast as possible, so it is advantagous for them to pile

in the resources and get rid of the disease as quickly as they can. If

you contrast to a female who can look after her offspring, she has

to maintain a certain level of activity, she's got to care for

offspring, suckel it, diverting resources into producing milk, so

she may have a different strategy to fighting disease. So they're

constantly learning more how we interact with virus, and it looks

like man flu might exist? Might is a good term. I'll agree there, yes.

In the two-day life of our pop-up clinic there's a constant flow of

people tested for flu. Some thought they had flu when all they had was

a nasty cold, others just wanted to know they were in the clear.

tested 80 people and got one case of flu, what do you think? That's

not bad, that's more or less what we might have expected, if we bear

in mind, 10-15% of the population get flu, that's spread out over a

flee-month season, we looked at people over two days, we were

expecting one or two cases and we got one, so that's not bad. That's

are new tests, what is a value value for them. This is the value

for the GP, at the bedside to ensure the person is infected by

influenza virus, that's specific. So it is rather interesting isn't

it It is beneficial if you can use these well. There's been so sign in

our pop-up lab of an imminent flu epidemic, but it is clear winter

viruses are a formidable enemy. Flu alone will kill thousands of people

in the UK this year. Scientists are on constant alert for dangerous new

strains and new vaccines are developed all the time. But as

we've seen with neurovirus we remain vulnerable when an outbreak

takes hold. There an element of chance about who gets winter

viruses but there things you can do it reduce risk. If you are in over

65, if asthmatic or chronic health problems or pregnant, there's still

time this year to get vaccinated, but next year remember to get it

done in Autumn. Hygiene rules, wash your hands as regularly as possible,