Trump’s refusal to accept the election results are hurting the vaccine development efforts.
Most of the vaccines are targeting the spike protein. I think the Russian one has added genes for the spike protein to some benign cold viruses. (adenoviruses). The two mRNA ones that are front-runners in the US both code for a stabilized version of the spike protein. I’m pretty sure someone is just injecting people with purified spike protein, although I forget which vaccine that is.
Yeah, we might have a lot of effective vaccines to choose among. That would be great news.
Some ideas on how vaccine development could take place even faster in the future.
In short: what if we did more trials before pandemics hit? Using preliminary vaccines developed around every possible threat that we can imagine?
That’s a little misleading. While it’s true that some of these vaccines were developed extremely quickly based on prior research into SARS-1 vaccines, we never had a finished, tested SARS-1 vaccine. It’s probably a good idea to do that human testing at least once, before rolling out a vaccine to a lot of people. And the risk isn’t just that you will catch the disease from it. (which the article correctly points out can’t happen from the mRNA vaccines.) The other risk is that the vaccine will provoke a deadly immune response in the recipient – something that seemed reasonably likely given the method this disease actually kills people. (Note that the steroid, dexamathasone, saves lives by DAMPENING the immune response to covid. That’s why it’s only given to those who are seriously ill.)
Also, while “we had the vaccine” in January, what we had was a few grams of vaccine made in a lab. We did not have massive quantities of a vaccine made in a factory. That was the point of “warp speed”, and also of several other efforts, including some by the Gates foundation – to build the factories WHILE the tiny quantities of vaccine were being tested.
Yes, when COVID-23 comes around, we may be able to quickly repurpose the COVID-19 factories to develop massive quantities of vaccine in less than a year. But that wasn’t an option this time, because we didn’t have those factories. (the flu vaccine is very different, and the same “assembly line” doesn’t switch over.)
Looks like convalescent serum isn’t useful after all.
Might be all ado about nothing. These people may have gotten blood clots regardless of the vaccine.
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Bad news today
This affects future promises, although J&J still days it meet the goals it set for US delivery. The stuff currently in the pipeline is said to be unaffected.
These vaccines are really a modern marvel IMO. They also show how advanced our medical capabilities are in the US. I truly believe maintaining supremacy in the healthcare and pharmaceutical space is going to really drive the US economy moving forward.
Yes, I’m super excited about the new vaccine technology. The DNA vaccines based on a modified harmless virus are fairly new, and the RNA vaccines are totally new, and both have a huge amount of promise. There was work being done (diverted for covid) on a flu vaccine that works for multiple versions. There’s work coming out of the covid research that could lead to a generic coronavirus vaccine (potentially preventing many colds) and I’m hopeful we’ll get vaccines for Lyme, Zika, who knows, maybe the holy grail of a malaria vaccine.
Also, looking at Canada’s trouble importing vaccines reaffirms my belief that we are better off paying Mexicans to work on US farms than we are driving most of those farms into Mexico (which i think is more likely than getting US citizens to do all our farm work.) I want to continue to be a food exporter, and produce not just grain, but fruits and vegetables domestically.
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I think food, drugs, semiconductors, fresh water, and energy are going to be huge assets for the US over the next 20 years.
Multiple versions of flies?
fixed
Preliminary study of vaccines in pregnant women
- Small study.
- No adverse effects found.
- Immunity generated (pregnant women are immune suppressed, so they don’t kill the baby, so this was an open question).
- Higher titers of antibodies than found after natural infection.
- Antibodies passed through the placenta and in breast milk.
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And some bad news
The j&j vaccine is rather similar to the AZ vaccine, so this isn’t shocking news. And i expect that they’ll start using it again, as the risks seem pretty low as compared to the benefits. But it’s not good.
I ran into this rather good survey article on where things stand now with vaccines, and thought I’d revive this thread for it:
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And here’s a study that compares the effectiveness of Moderna and Pfizer as the delta variant became dominant. (spoiler: Moderna appears to be holding up better against Delta than Pfizer.)
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And here I was keen to get Pfizer. Moderna ftw
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Being a J&J lady, if I’m “allowed” to get Moderna, I’ll go get it