Improved Rabies Vaccine Formulation

The SPBN GASGAS vaccine suspension (10^7.5 FFU/mL, 3.0 mL) was filled in flexible sachets made of a proprietary foil (“soft blister”) and embedded in egg-flavoured gelatine-based baits. The SPBN GASGAS vaccine construct is derived from a cDNA clone (SAD L16) of the vaccine strain SAD B19. Through site-directed mutagenesis, the residual pathogenicity observed with the parental strain in mice after i.c. inoculation has been abolished (amino acid exchange at amino acid position 333 of the glycoprotein gene). Additionally, all 3 nucleotides at amino acid position 194 of the glycoprotein gene were exchanged to circumvent, potentially, a partial reversion to virulence due to a compensatory mutation at this position. Finally, a second identically modified glycoprotein gene was inserted between the G- and L-gene [31 (link),32 (link),33 (link)].