Huge news that could put some intranasal Covid vaccines on the fast track! A global consortium is going to run human challenge trials.
News on this & much more, in my latest next generation Covid vax update (No. 15), now online @PLOS
Thank you for this!
The many Covid deniers might make good volunteers, as they have nothing to fear.
@hildabast @PLOS that's scary.
@hildabast @PLOS Given what we know about how SARS-CoV-2 infects so many organs/systems, I am gobsmacked that any body could declare challenge trials ethical.
Would we allow challenge trials for polio?
I realize that 1) nobody asked me and 2) I don't make the rules, especially in the UK, but I'm still deeply disturbed by it. (Especially for the US volunteers, since they do not have universal health care!)
@hildabast I know that they did a challenge study in the UK early on, and I wasn't a fan of that either.
Why isn't polio a good analogy? Both have quite low immediate fatality rates; both have pretty devastating long-term effects in a minority of people who get it...
@ducky Polio has a much higher fatality rate, paralysis is quite common, and post-polio syndrome is very common. https://immunisationhandbook.health.gov.au/contents/vaccine-preventable-diseases/poliomyelitis
@hildabast I apologize, I had misremembered that the CFR for polio was ~1%.
Paralysis rate (1/200) seems comparable to the ME/CFS-level of Long COVID; yes, they are different but both suck. Post-COVID increases risk of a zillion different diseases. There is precedent that there is *likely* to be something just as bad as post-polio. (There was a study in macaques which found Lewy bodies in 100% of infected macaques; years after the 1918 influenza, there were a lot more Parkinsons cases.)
@ducky I don't think Covid or its repercussions should be trivialized at all - but nor should polio, and the analogy does that.
@hildabast Sorry, I did NOT mean to trivialize polio, but to make the actual genuine real dangers obvious and visible.
COVID-19 can infect any cell with an ACE2 receptor, which is a huge percentage of cells in your body. It causes severe problems in a small percentage of people, elevates risk of other disease, and we don't know what happens in 15 years. I cannot see how this could be anything but bad for the participants.
@ducky I expect they would be very well-informed, and that only people at very low risk would be eligible. It's not like the beginning, when very little was known.
It's not only human challenge studies in which participants accept risks for the common good. Nor is research the only activity in which people face risks in the hopes of helping others.
@ducky Unfair analogies do trivialize the risks of the more serious condition in a comparison, whether that's the intention or not. Nor can they provide a reasonable perspective on risk - they exaggerate one while trivializing the other, and neither helps.
@hildabast Pssst! Dunno if you've seen this, but Moderna is teasing that they have a new and better version of Spikevax: https://investors.modernatx.com/news/news-details/2024/Moderna-Achieves-Positive-Interim-Results-from-Phase-3-Trial-of-Next-Generation-COVID-19-Vaccine/default.aspx and https://investors.modernatx.com/news/news-details/2024/Moderna-Advances-Multiple-Vaccine-Programs-to-Late-Stage-Clinical-Trials/default.aspx
They don't give hard details, unfortunately.
@hildabast Thank you again for these great vax updates!
@PLOS @hildabast Does a five year study mean that it will follow participants for five years or that it will take five years to complete? In other words, does a “fast track” here mean five years or, if all goes well, much sooner?
@FiveByFive @PLOS I gather it's money to keep the program running for 5 years, for several studies.