US approves first vaccine for bees

A Georgia biotechnology company has received conditional approval from the Department of Agriculture for the first vaccine for honey bees, a move that scientists say could pave the way for control of a host of viruses and pests that have decimated the global population. It is the first vaccine approved for an insect in the United States.

Athens, Georgia-based company Dalan Animal Health has developed a prophylactic vaccine that protects bees from American foulbrood, the aggressive bacteria that can spread rapidly between hives. Previous treatments have included burning infected colonies and all associated equipment, or using antibiotics. Diamond Animal Health, the manufacturer collaborating with Dalan, holds the conditional license.

Dalail Freitak, an associate professor of bee research at the Karl-Franzens University of Graz in Austria and chief scientific officer at Dalan, said the vaccine could help change the way scientists approach animal health.

“There are millions of beehives around the world, and they don’t have good health care compared to other animals,” she said. “Now we have the tools to improve your resistance against disease.”

Before you start imagining a tiny syringe being inserted into a bee, the vaccine, which contains dead versions of the bacteria Paenibacillus larvae, comes in the form of food. The vaccine is incorporated into royal jelly, a sugary food given to queen bees. Once ingested, the vaccine is then deposited in your ovaries, giving the developing larvae immunity as they hatch.

Scientists have long assumed that insects cannot acquire immunity because they lack antibodies, the proteins that help the immune systems of many animals recognize and fight bacteria and viruses.

Once scientists understood that insects could indeed acquire immunity and pass it on to their offspring, Freitak set about answering the question of how they did it. In 2015, she and two other researchers identified the specific protein that triggers an immune response in offspring and realized they could cultivate immunity in a population of bees with a single queen.

His first objective was to combat American foulbrood, a bacterial disease that turns the larvae dark brown and causes the hive to emit a rotten smell (also known as American foulbrood). The disease spread during the 1800’s and early 1900’s in bee colonies in parts of the United States.

Although American foulbrood is not as destructive as varroa mites, the bacteria can easily wipe out colonies of 60,000 bees.

The introduction of a vaccine comes at a critical time for bees, which are vital to the world’s food system but are in decline globally due to climate change, pesticides, habitat loss and disease.

“There is no perfect solution, but there is a toxic stew of causality, and some of it includes new and old known diseases,” said Keith Delaplane, professor of entomology at the University of Georgia and director of its bee program, which provided groundwork. of research for Dalan. “It’s death by a thousand cuts.”

While feeding on pollen and nectar, bees pollinate about a third of the food crops in the United States and help produce an estimated $15 billion in crops each year. Many beekeepers rent out their hives across the country to help pollinate almonds, pears, cherries, apples and other produce.

At least three-quarters of flowering plants require the help of pollinators, including bees, butterflies and moths, to produce fruits and seeds.

Chris Hiatt, who raises bees in North Dakota and California and is president of the American Honey Producers Association, participated in the vaccine trial over the summer with about 800 queen bees in North Dakota.

“Beekeepers just don’t want to be dependent on antibiotics. Most beekeepers give them once a year or when there are outbreaks,” he said. “Antibiotics can eliminate some of the beneficial microbes. It has the potential to add other things as well.”

Annette Kleiser, CEO of Dalan, called the vaccine “a major breakthrough”.

“Bees are livestock and should have the same modern tools to care for and protect them that we have for our chickens, cats, dogs and so on,” Kleiser said.

Conditional approval is a mechanism that allows companies to expedite the approval of vaccines if they demonstrate that there is a high unmet need in the market, Kleiser said.

“The agency realizes that these new tools are needed in the market to help change practices,” Kleiser said, adding that the Department of Agriculture recommended that the company take a conditional path “to get the vaccine to market as quickly as possible.”

Kleiser said the company needed to show evidence of “safety, purity and certain degrees of effectiveness” to gain approval and that it intended to continue collecting data while applying for full approval. Dalan also hopes to use the American foulbrood vaccine as a blueprint for producing vaccines for other diseases that affect bees.

“When we started, there was no regulatory path,” she said. “No one has ever developed a vaccine against bugs; they are wild animals that fly around,” compared to domesticated cattle and pets with vaccination protocols. She added, “We really hope to change the industry now.”

Delaplane, the University of Georgia entomologist, agreed.

“Someday,” he said, “we might have a cocktail that solves a lot of bee problems. It would be the holy grail.”