antallergy.org

By John Gray

I am 74 and my first encounter with what I presume was an ant bite was in 1942 at Newcastle in NSW.

It was a warm Summer evening and I was lying on the lawn in the twilight when all the symptoms that I have become familiar with appeared.
Rushed into the local hospital I was kept under observation and the diagnosis was that “I had been bitten by a spider.”

The classic swelling and itching and the weal’s on my body are still a vivid memory after 60 years but I was fortunate not to experience them again until about ten years later when I moved to Tasmania and into the realm of a far more dangerous and aggressive creature.

MON 27 JUN 2005

By SUE NAPIER MHA
Shadow Minister for Health

Shadow Health Minister Sue Napier today called on the State Labor Government to listen to the concerns of many Tasmanians who are allergic to jack jumpers and adopt the State Liberals’ policy to fund immunotherapy treatment for jack jumper allergies.

Mrs Napier said that the world-leading immunotherapy treatment program at the Royal Hobart Hospital is set to end for the original trial participants and additional funding is desperately needed for the program to continue.

MON 27 JUN 2005

By ANNE MATHER

Every time 13-year-old Jarrah Wilson steps out of his front door, his life is in danger.

He dares not play at parks, does not go to the beach and cannot even sit in his school playground.

Like thousands of Tasmanians, Jarrah Wilson has a severe allergy to the common jack jumper ant.

Jarrah has suffered severe reactions after two stings and a third bite could prove fatal.

Although world-class Tasmanian research has discovered a successful vaccine for people sensitive to jack jumpers, funding restraints mean few people have access to the cure.

The vaccine trial, which is nearing completion, has already run out of money and without more funding the research—and the vaccine—will be left in limbo.

MON 27 JUN 2005

By ANNE MATHER

When Penny Haley found out she was pregnant with her second child she decided to take no chances—she left the state.

The Hobart mother is allergic to jack jumpers, and the ants are found in greatest numbers in Tasmania.

While she normally tries to suppress her fears and live as normal life as possible, Mrs Haley was determined to keep her unborn child safe from danger.

SUE NAPIER, MHA
Shadow Minister for Health

Shadow Health Minister Sue Napier today called on the State Labor Government to listen to the concerns of many Tasmanians who are allergic to jack jumpers and adopt the State Liberals’ policy to fund immunotherapy treatment for jack jumper allergies.

Mrs Napier said that the world-leading immunotherapy treatment program at the Royal Hobart Hospital is set to end for the original trial participants and additional funding is desperately needed for the program to continue.

“The current doctor responsible for the program, Dr Konrad Blackman, is simply unable to continue to commit significant hours of voluntary time to a program that the State Labor Government does not appear to support,” Mrs Napier said.

“The Tasmanian patients fortunate enough to have been part of the trial have had three years of immunotherapy treatment. But if their treatment is discontinued, they face a 10 per cent risk of redeveloping their allergy, which could in fact cost them their lives.

“And this does not include the thousands of other Tasmanians who are suffer from jack jumper allergy and are desperate to gain access to this ground-breaking treatment.

“Tasmanians who are allergic to jack jumper bites, including many young children, have a life saving treatment almost within their grasp, but the State Labor Government is letting them down through its ‘no-more-funding’ stance.

Mrs Napier said it was not acceptable for the State Labor Government to put lives on the line in this way and to demonstrate such scant regard for world-leading treatment developed here in Tasmania.

“Tasmanian scientists and medical experts have developed a world-leading jack jumper treatment that can save the lives of many Tasmanians and Australians,” Mrs Napier said.

“A clinical trial started in 2002, involving more than 60 Tasmanians, and this demonstrated 100 per cent success at preventing severe reactions and received international recognition when published in The Lancet, the world’s leading and most prestigious medical journal.

“But in 2004, the Lennon Labor Government cut short the project refusing to extend this life-saving treatment to sufferers beyond the original trial participants.

“In April this year the State Liberals announced that a Hidding Liberal Government would fund ongoing immunotherapy treatment for Tasmanians who experience life threatening reactions to jack jumper stings. We urge the State Labor Government to make a similar commitment.

“The State Liberals believe that this world-leading life-saving jack jumper treatment program must not be allowed to end due to Lennon Labor Government penny pinching,” Mrs Napier said.

16 JUNE 2005

HANSARD - House of Assembly

24. HEALTH

Mrs NAPIER asked the Minister for Health and Human Services -

(1) Are funds included in the 2004-05 Budget to treat those people who have already undergone desensitisation tests so they can proceed with the treatment available for their life-threatening reaction to jack jumper stings?

(2) What efforts are being made, now that research is completed and proven, to ensure this research can be commercialised in Tasmania?

(3) Will the Department of Health and Human Services be assisting the Royal Hobart Hospital and researchers with funding to ensure this treatment receives Therapeutic Goods Administration registration - a step required before Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme listing?

(4) If not, why not?

Mr LLEWELLYN replied -

FRI 10 JUN 2005

By LINDA SMITH

Penny Haley first knew how dangerous the black Tasmanian jack-jumper was when she was 29 years old and at the beach with her family.

“I was bitten as a child but never reacted,” the young mother said.

“But within 20 minutes of being bitten at Bicheno, I was writhing in agony and vomiting.

“Dad raced me to Swansea to the medical centre and I only found out later that, all the way, he was rehearsing CPR in his head because he thought that he was going to have to use it.”

FRI 10 JUN 2005

By LINDA SMITH

The leader of Tasmania’s world-class jack jumper vaccine project has criticised the State Government for failing to provide funds to save the lives of thousands of Tasmanians.

After five years of trials, Tasmania’s treatment for jack jumper allergies has shown a 100 per cent success rate at preventing severe reactions and is ready to be made available to the rest of the country.

But unless funding is given, the treatment program will fold at the end of this year.

THU 09 JUN 2005

Hansard
House of Assembly

Mrs NAPIER (Question) - My question is to the Minister for Health and Human Services. Minister, I understand that you have received correspondence to advise you that jack jumper immunotherapy treatment at the Royal Hobart Hospital will discontinue for the original trial participants at this end of this year without additional funding, as research funds will be exhausted. The doctor responsible, Dr Blackman, is no longer able to commit his own voluntary time, of which he has given a considerable amount, given the continual lack of response by the Government to this matter. Minister, are you aware that these patients have had three years of immunotherapy treatment? However, if treatment is discontinued, they face a 10 per cent risk of redeveloping their allergy, which could in fact cost them their lives, let alone the fact that there are many Tasmanians who would like to access this immunotherapy program but who are unable to do so because of lack of funding. Minister, are you aware of the Liberals’ position on this? Do you agree that it is not a costly exercise to fund immunotherapy, including extending it? Will you now commit in a bipartisan way to supporting the continuation of immunotherapy treatments or will you let this ground-breaking Tasmanian program simply wither and die?

SAT 09 APR 2005

Tasmanians with potentially fatal jack jumper allergies will receive help if the Liberals win the next state election.

Opposition Leader Rene Hidding and health spokeswoman Sue Napier yesterday said if they won government, the Liberals would spend $240,000 in the first year of a program to desensitise 500 people against a fatal reaction to a jack jumper bite.

Mr Hidding said five people had died from jack jumper bites in Tasmania between 1988 and 2001.

FRI 18 FEB 2005

By KATHY GRUBE

The World’s first jack jumper ant vaccine could be commercially released in a year if $1 million funding is found, say researchers.

Tasmania’s world-leading work to develop a cure for life-threatening jack jumper allergies is ready to be made available to the rest of the country after five years of trials.

Former Royal Hobart Hospital emergency medicine specialist Simon Brown, who nearly died from his first bad reaction to a jack jumper sting while collecting venom for the project, is hoping to get the vaccine listed on the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme.

Dr Brown, who now works at the University of Western Australia but is still the vaccine project leader, said there was no commercial interest in the venture because the amounts required were too small to be profitable.

ABC RADIO - The World Today - Thursday, 17 February 2005

Reporter: Annie Guest

ELEANOR HALL: To Tasmania now, where a one centimetre long insect has been forcing locals to flee their state.

The “jack jumper” ant kills at a rate of one person every four years and causes severe illness in hundreds of others.

But researchers in Hobart say now they’re a step closer to developing a vaccine, as Annie Guest reports.

MEDIA RELEASE - Royal Hobart Hospital Research Foundation

17 February 2005

The Tasmanian project team researching potentially fatal reactions to the sting of the Jack Jumper ant has received a timely donation from a leading world producer of pyrethrum oil.

At a ceremony in Hobart today, Botanical Resources Australia donated $12,000 to the Research Foundation to support the next stage of research into reactions to the ant’s venom.

Research Foundation Executive Director Tony Reidy said that Botanical Resources Australia’s donation brought the amount of support provided directly to the Jack Jumper project by corporate and public donors during the past few months to $16,000.

“It is only through such a partnership between the community and the corporate sector that this vital research is made possible”, he said.

SUN 18 APR 2004

By FRAN VOSS

People who suffer a potentially life-threatening allergic reaction to jack jumper stings would gladly pay for immuno-therapy treatment if it meant not having to live on a knife’s edge the rest of their lives, a West Tamar victim said this week.

Michael Roberts, 61, of Loira, developed symptoms 10 years ago and has since been stung on average once a year, requiring emergency medical treatment.

Within 10 minutes he suffers dizziness, severe rash and his throat swells, causing breathing difficulties.

He has to rely on his local doctor being available or his family being at home to drive him to hospital.

WED 07 APR 2004

Each summer, tens of thousands of Australians prepare themselves, not for the joys of endless barbeques with friends, walks in the forest or lying on the beach, but for a life of virtual imprisonment, living with the fear that a single sting from a jack jumper ant could kill them.

Jack Jumper Allergy affects at least 3% of the Tasmanian population, and until recently there has been no known effective treatment.

In March 2003, the results of a trial being conducted at the Royal Hobart Hospital produced internationally ground breaking results with a breakthrough treatment for the allergy that was proven to be almost 99% effective.

(see http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/2864939.stm)

The allergy is severe and life threatening and allergic individuals experience varying grades of anaphylactic shock, which in some cases has resulted in death.