According to Reuters, the Food and Drug Administration announced that traces of DNA pig virus were found in Merck & Co. RotaTeq vaccines (Rotavirus Vaccine Live Oral Pentavalent). Past March 22nd., the regulators agency detected a similar DNA virus in GlaxoSmithKline Plc., Rotarix vaccine (Rotavirus Vaccine Live Oral) and suggested immediate suspension.

Back then, the FDA recommended inoculation with Merck´s vaccine, however, according to the agency, the virus found is harmless and does not present any safety issues.

Last March 22nd. The FDA advise Glaxo to withdraw the product jointly with a warning for doctors and specialists on Merck & Co´s RotaTeq (Rotavirus Vaccine, Live, Oral, Pentavalent). Back then GlaxoSmithKline sent a statement arguing that the virus (known as porcine circovirus 1, or PCV-1) “does not multiply and is harmless in humans”. The British company said that PCV-1 is found daily in meat products.

GlaxoSmithKline´s Rotarix, is an oral vaccine, made from a weakened strain of human rotavirus that has to be grown inside living cells before being purified into a vaccine dose. Glaxo uses a line of monkey kidney cells, or vero cells.

Glaxo said they have distributed around 69 million doses (almost 2 million in the U.S alone) with no safety or security issues.

Rotarix protects children against a diarrhoea-causing virus called, Rotavirus and is basically the name given to a family of germs that share similar characteristics when looked though an electronic microscope. The genetic material of the virus is made of two strains of RNA divided in 11 segments, their infection part is recovered by a protein of three sheath.