Inoculate Against a Global Vaccine Crisis

On Feb. 27, 2017, the World Health Organization (WHO) named a dozen bacteria as major global health threats, underscoring the surge in antibiotic resistance and paucity of vaccines that, combined, now render incurable the infections caused by those germs.

There is plenty to fret about on the microbial front at the moment: Several scary strains of flu are circulating, and Australia’s winter 2017 flu season was one of the country’s deadliest in recent years. Any hope of protecting the world, generally, against the resurgence of old microbes, as well as the emergence of new ones — man-made biological menaces, for example — hinges on resolving the breakdown in the manufacturing of vaccines and moving the best, most applicable pharmaceutical innovations into the commercial pipeline for affordable access.