Single Vaccine Against All COVID & SARS Variants?

[euro]

Lots of folks in other parts of the world who would jump at the chance.

Probably true, but there are all sorts of ethical and practical reasons why it is not straightforward to conduct drug/vaccine trials in many of the countries you probably have in mind. Not necessarily impossible, but not as easy as one might think.

 

[euro]

It would be great to have a vax that worked to combat all variants, although I’m not sure how that would be possible. Snip27.

You are right, it is not possible to have a vaccine against future variants because we don’t know yet what the mutations will be that allow the virus to evolve into a different strain. So, with all such approaches (including the Army one), the vaccine will have to be updated (modified) for each new strain and this will make necessary clinical trial work each time (not as elaborate as for the initial approval of the vaccine, but still, any new entity has to be studied in clinical trials to make sure it is effective, and safe).

 

[Aerides]

...It seems that the current booster works well against Delta, but not Omicron. My best friend and her husband went to a party with around 20-25 people on 12/22. Everyone there was vaccinated and boosted. Several have now tested positive for COVID. Fortunately they all have very mild symptoms - scratchy throat, light congestion, and somewhat lower energy level. Omicron doesn’t seem to last very long as they’re being advised to retest on 12/31 and most got initial test on 12/27.

I believe that shows the booster is working well - mild symptoms. If you mean working well to be completely stopping infection at all, then sure, but that's always been the case - preventing severe illness is the main metric of success.

meanwhile, the J&J booster is looking better than older reports:

https://www.cnbc.com/2021/12/30/jj-...-covid-variant-says-south-african-study-.html

 

[eytonxav]

Would be wonderful to have a silver bullet against the virus and its strains, but I am resigned to the reality this will become like the annual flu shot where they try to forecast the most likely strains during a season and tailor a shot for such strains. I still would like to see more efforts go into anti-virals that can keep one from becoming seriously ill and would also love to see better analysis of how many people actually die with the virus vs from the virus, although that may be asking too much.

 

[Scuba]

You are right, it is not possible to have a vaccine against future variants because we don’t know yet what the mutations will be that allow the virus to evolve into a different strain. So, with all such approaches (including the Army one), the vaccine will have to be updated (modified) for each new strain and this will make necessary clinical trial work each time (not as elaborate as for the initial approval of the vaccine, but still, any new entity has to be studied in clinical trials to make sure it is effective, and safe).

Agreed. Unfortunately this indicates to me that eliminating COVID is very unlikely and we each have to decide how much to change our lifestyles permanently to deal with it. Seems likely that there will always be one or more new variants that current jabs won’t address. As long as variants have mild symptoms like Omicron seems to, we are going to behave as we have during cold and flu season pre-COVID … ie try to avoid anyone who’s not feeling well, and isolate if we aren’t feeling well. Wash our hands and try not to touch our faces unless hands are freshly washed.

Not willing to avoid all travel or social activities. YMMV

 

[pacergal]

This is so exciting, will be looking forward to more studies.

 

[ERhoosier]

Some preliminary evidence suggests that Omicron infection produces antibodies against other COVID strains. If true, then Omicron survivors may be (at least somewhat) protected against infection with other COVID strains and 'breakthrough infections' after Omicron might be unlikely. Only time will tell.

 

[audreyh1]

Texas or Covid?...... Texas or Covid?......

That is a tough one......

Plenty of Covid available in Texas!

 

[martyp]

There isn't really anything particularly magical about this approach. It is commonly referred to as "polyvalent vaccines" which means one shot provides the ability to generate immunity against more than one serotype. For a good example, google "Pneumovax 23" which is a pneumococcal vaccine that works against 23 different strains of the bacterium.
The US Army work is exploring a central vaccination scaffold that allows addition of new spike protein sequences as they arise. Each time you want to add a new strain, there will be re-engineering (and clinical trial work) needed to cover new variants, so while I don't want to rain on any parades (and I'm all for researching a wide variety of approaches), this will not end the pandemic any time soon, even if it DOES work as intended and even if for some magical reason we are able to convince the "never vaxers" to actually take the shot.

+1