BRUSSELS - A Belgian researcher was quoted last Wednesday as saying a vaccine to tackle allergies could hit the market within two years following promising results from trials involving birch pollen.

Professor Paul Van Cauwenberge, who coordinates a European allergy and asthma research project, said researchers at the Medical University of Vienna have been able to protect a trial group of 124 people against the effects of birch pollen allergy.

They were injected with a genetically modified version of the pollen.

"There is a good chance that this synthetic vaccine would result in a safe, healing vaccine," Van Cauwenberge told Belgian daily De Morgen in an interview.

"The vaccinated patients reacted like healthy people. If they (the researchers) can confirm this on a larger scale there is a good chance that we, within a few years, would not only obtain a safe but also a 'healing' vaccine," Van Cauwenberge added.

"They are using a technique which allows mass production. If these results are confirmed on a larger scale ... a vaccine could hit the market relatively soon, within about two years," he said.