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Respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) is a deadly virus that causes serious respiratory illnesses in children and supposedly kills around 200 children each year. Around 75,000 of them are admitted into hospitals on a yearly basis, reports NBC News. Further, the reports states that around 66,000 to 199,000 children die from this virus on a global scale every year.

According to NBC, researchers at the National Institutes of Health believe they have found a vaccine that could combat this dangerous virus and protect children. RSV apparently infects almost every other child usually causing a bad case of cold. However, in some children it can end up resulting in a severe form of pneumonia which can be fatal. While there are vaccines to tackle influenza, whopping cough and other related bacteria that causes pneumonia, there has not been a vaccine against RSV, up until now.

Dr. Ruth Karron at Johns Hopkins University was reportedly quoted as saying, "It's the next mountain to climb in terms of serious respiratory illness in children. Part of the delay has been a delay in the recognition of the importance of RSV. We have made wonderful vaccines against other causes of pneumonia in children, but as those vaccines were being developed there was frankly less attention paid to RSV." Reports NBC.

According to News Medical, the team who conducted a clinical trial, reportedly engineered the virus genetically and leveraged the virus' own machinery to develop the preventive vaccine against RSV. The vaccine was tested on around 15 adults and 45 babies and enabled results. It is still in the early stages of testing but holds promising potential, reports NBC News.