COVID-19: Vaccine/antidote and testing procedures Megathread [Mod Warning - Post #1]

hmmm · 02-05-2020 3:26pm

Scott Gottlieb has been one of the most accurate commentators throughout this crisis. He thinks the US will have a few million doses ready by Autumn, which could be used in an emergency.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4NRV-8s_TQo

Harry Palmr · 02-05-2020 3:34pm

Found it

https://boards.ie/thread/2058062347/1/#post112860921

ShineOn7 · 02-05-2020 7:24pm

hmmm wrote: »

I'd ask those of you who are sceptical of vaccines, or believe we'll never have a vaccine, to please leave this thread alone - there's lots more places for your views.

I'm afraid we need as much realism as we do positivity

Isn't there ample evidence that SARS 1 from 2003 didn't get a vaccine because of how complex the virus is?

What Username Guidelines · 02-05-2020 7:25pm

ShineOn7 wrote: »

I'm afraid we need as much realism as we do positivity

Isn't there ample evidence that SARS 1 from 2003 didn't get a vaccine because of how complex the virus is?

I think it was more down to sars being contained and no need for investment into a vaccine by then, but could be wrong. You’d hope some of the work could be transferable to this.

Harry Palmr · 02-05-2020 7:39pm

SARS various vaccine research programmes ended as there was no imperative to continue after it blew itself out. No money in jabs. We're paying for it now.

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/amp/ncna1150091

hmmm · 04-05-2020 1:43pm

Moderna have received nearly 500 million dollars from the US government to produce a vaccine. The report starts off like the usual "scandal" type reporting, but then a professor from Harvard who is interviewed afterwards puts it all in perspective - it's an extraordinary time, and losing a few billion on vaccine bets will be worth it if it works.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TddfLvAeTqQ

Snow Garden · 04-05-2020 1:56pm

pauldavis123 wrote: »

Still no vaccine for the 2002 SARS so I would not use the this in your long term planning.

Funding for the SARS vaccine program was pulled when the virus was contained. I heard a virologist saying weeks ago that the Covid19 vaccine would be quicker if they had finished the SARS vaccine program and trials.

hmmm · 04-05-2020 2:08pm

Snow Garden wrote: »

Funding for the SARS vaccine program was pulled when the virus was contained. I heard a virologist saying weeks ago that the Covid19 vaccine would be quicker if they had finished the SARS vaccine program and trials.

Moderna were involved in developing the SARS vaccine, and have been so quick off the mark with COVID because they were able to re-use the technology and research they had developed.

hmmm · 05-05-2020 3:13pm

https://www.fiercebiotech.com/biotech/pfizer-biontech-dose-first-u-s-subject-covid-19-vaccine

Pfizer and BioNTech have begun dosing participants in a U.S. clinical trial of their COVID-19 vaccine candidates. The dose-escalation stage of the trial will enroll up to 360 subjects, initially out of sites in New York and Maryland.

The U.S. clinical trial is studying four variants of the vaccine, code-named a1, b1, b2 and c2, to quickly determine which combination of mRNA format and target antigen holds the most promise. Pfizer and BioNTech are assessing candidates that contain uridine-containing mRNA, nucleoside-modified mRNA or self-amplifying mRNA.

Hmmzis · 06-05-2020 10:21pm

Good article about monoclonal antibody work going on:

https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/05/race-antibodies-stop-new-coronavirus#

hmmm · 07-05-2020 10:02am

https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2020/05/coronavirus-strains-transmissible/611239/

Good article about how the newspaper headlines of Covid "mutating" is overstating what is actually happening, and the difference between a "mutation" and a "strain".

But influenza is notable for mutating quickly. Coronaviruses—which, to be clear, belong to a completely separate family from influenza viruses—change at a tenth of the speed. The new one, SARS-CoV-2, is no exception. “There’s nothing out of the ordinary here,” says Grubaugh. Yes, the virus has picked up several mutations since it first jumped into humans in late 2019, but no more than scientists would have predicted. Yes, its family tree has branched into different lineages, but none seems materially different from the others. “This is still such a young epidemic that, given the slow mutation rate, it would be a surprise if we saw anything this soon,” Houldcroft says.

hmmm · 07-05-2020 3:25pm

Moderna have got FDA approval to move to Phase 2 trials

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VnAe8g7hzqc

Hoping to start phase 3 in early Summer.

hmmm · 08-05-2020 2:41pm

Good overview of where we are at. https://www.wired.com/story/frontrunners-emerge-in-the-race-for-a-covid-19-vaccine/

Challenge trials are increasingly likely it seems to accelerate testing, where healthy volunteers are deliberately exposed to the virus after receiving a vaccine. This has really profound ethical implications where you have a virus with no cure.

Hmmzis · 08-05-2020 4:13pm

hmmm wrote: »

Good overview of where we are at. https://www.wired.com/story/frontrunners-emerge-in-the-race-for-a-covid-19-vaccine/

Challenge trials are increasingly likely it seems to accelerate testing, where healthy volunteers are deliberately exposed to the virus after receiving a vaccine. This has really profound ethical implications where you have a virus with no cure.

The scary part in this is that the challenge trials will need a placebo control group.

Mike3287 · 08-05-2020 4:19pm

Hmmzis wrote: »

The scary part in this is that the challenge trials will need a placebo control group.

Mad

How do they do this with lethal viruses like Ebola, Marburg?

Gather up vulnerable in society like homeless, drug users etc and pay them well

Hmmzis · 08-05-2020 5:34pm

Mike3287 wrote: »

Mad

How do they do this with lethal viruses like Ebola, Marburg?

Gather up vulnerable in society like homeless, drug users etc and pay them well

With those it's very much possible to go without a control group as the differences in outcomes should be rather obvious if the vaccine works or not.

For SARS-cov-2 it's a bit trickier as with young and healthy volunteers the general outcomes would be hard to quantify without a control group.

What Username Guidelines · 08-05-2020 9:10pm

Was thinking about this a bit more today and with a safe vaccine a long way away most likely, is waiting for a vaccine a viable or realistic option? I don’t mean let’s all go for herd immunity, but it seems like dodging this thing for 2 years would be difficult without locking yourself down.

I know this is a novel virus so I’m not sure how you can compare it to previous pandemics. But even with out of control ones such as the Spanish flu, it came in waves and eventually the waves receded. Why, I’m not sure, maybe it was herd immunity of the affected regions, and with less of a connected world than today it “only” managed to penetrate 20% of the population.

We’re in this 2 months and 1% of Dublin is infected (confirmed) so probably many multiples more, maybe as high as 10-15% which will put a dent, albeit small, in the spread, of immunity is a thing. With this, the hospitals have not been overwhelmed and with increased awareness of hand washing and social distancing, working from home for those who can, do we really think this will keep spreading for two years while we wait for a vaccine? Could it be possible that as we relax the restrictions and we, potentially, don’t see a massive spike, people relax even more and it moves into the background to maybe resurge at a later time? Most waves in previous pandemics seem to last 4-6 months max and then a lull before the next.

Maybe we just can’t rely on what might or might not happen based on previous pandemics.

bennyineire · 08-05-2020 9:20pm

What Username Guidelines wrote: »

Was thinking about this a bit more today and with a safe vaccine a long way away most likely, is waiting for a vaccine a viable or realistic option? I don’t mean let’s all go for herd immunity, but it seems like dodging this thing for 2 years would be difficult without locking yourself down.

I know this is a novel virus so I’m not sure how you can compare it to previous pandemics. But even with out of control ones such as the Spanish flu, it came in waves and eventually the waves receded. Why, I’m not sure, maybe it was herd immunity of the affected regions, and with less of a connected world than today it “only” managed to penetrate 20% of the population.

We’re in this 2 months and 1% of Dublin is infected (confirmed) so probably many multiples more, maybe as high as 10-15% which will put a dent, albeit small, in the spread, of immunity is a thing. With this, the hospitals have not been overwhelmed and with increased awareness of hand washing and social distancing, working from home for those who can, do we really think this will keep spreading for two years while we wait for a vaccine? Could it be possible that as we relax the restrictions and we, potentially, don’t see a massive spike, people relax even more and it moves into the background to maybe resurge at a later time? Most waves in previous pandemics seem to last 4-6 months max and then a lull before the next.

Maybe we just can’t rely on what might or might not happen based on previous pandemics.

Wrong thread fella

flazio · 09-05-2020 2:05pm

I see a lot of workplaces are saying they will introduce temperature checks on their employees to establish that they do not have a fever and (alongside no coughing) are therefore clear of Covid 19. I'd be wary about trusting this if I'm honest. I can think of at least 2 high profile contractors, Claire Byrne and Ryan Tubridy who didn't develop a fever.
Anyone else feeling wary about this?

Hmmzis · 09-05-2020 9:13pm

Antiviral and interferon treatment combination, needs to be given early:

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(20)31042-4/fulltext

Maybe an option in nursing homes where IV medication can be administered.

The interferon apears to be a link to some genetically linked susceptibilty. Some people have downregulated interferon genes, potentially causing severe disease that way. Innate immune response is therefore delayed for those people, the adaptive immune response then has a harder time to deal with the infection. The older the person, the more likely it is to have a dysregulated innate immune response.

https://www.nature.com/articles/nri3547

This bug is starting to slowly make sense in they way it affects people.

hmmm · 13-05-2020 3:58pm

https://www.biocentury.com/article/305171

"Just focusing on the spike protein or even more reductionist, the receptor binding part of the spike protein, may not be enough to confer long-term protection. Data from the previous SARS outbreak suggests that immune responses to more than one antigen are required for the induction of long-term immunity.

There is also a relevant debate about what kind of protective immunity a patient attains if infected with the virus, and how viral load correlates with severity of disease, reflecting just how little is known about the pathology of this new virus.

All the effort is necessary, and to be appreciated and applauded, but at the same time it is important to be realistic about the prospects: the reality is that by necessity, the vaccines are being rushed into trials without a solid grasp on the immune responses that they elicit."

I sense a bit of wariness from scientists about over-promising on vaccines, but even though these are incredibly clever people I think they are missing the point. Even if a vaccine is produced rapidly which only gives short-term immunity, it will be enough to allow people get back to relative normality. Short-term immunity buys time for some of the other vaccines which may give a longer-term immunity.

Harry Palmr · 13-05-2020 4:24pm

Pro Luke O'Neill paper as published in Nature outlining background to BCG research as potential antivirus solution.

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41577-020-0337-y

Wall Street Journal article on trials around the world

https://www.wsj.com/amp/articles/old-vaccine-gets-new-look-in-tests-for-coronavirus-protection-11589362202

is_that_so · 13-05-2020 4:28pm

Harry Palmr wrote: »

Pro Luke O'Neill paper as published in Nature outlining background to BCG research as potential antivirus solution.

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41577-020-0337-y

Wall Street Journal article on trials around the world

https://www.wsj.com/amp/articles/old-vaccine-gets-new-look-in-tests-for-coronavirus-protection-11589362202

WSJ article can only be read with a subscription.

Hmmzis · 13-05-2020 5:17pm

Regarding pathology, this one in The Cell is a good read and explains a lot of things:

https://www.cell.com/pb-assets/products/coronavirus/CELL_CELL-D-20-00985.pdf

The main treatment options from that would be interferon (beta) and a strong anti-inflammatory drug (they mentioned tocilizumab and anakinra) the moment a patient end up in a hospital.

This is a clinical trial showing the effects in patients:

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(20)31042-4/fulltext

While not quite back to normality with that approach, it should help reduce the severity and mortality if administered in a timely fashion and widely available testing.

Then the next question is how do we do prophylaxis for the general public to induce a more robust interferon response in cells to get the innate immune response going sooner?

Hmmzis · 13-05-2020 6:04pm

Also, this looks to be good news for recovered patients:

https://www.researchsquare.com/article/rs-27359/v1

Harry Palmr · 13-05-2020 6:09pm

is_that_so wrote: »

WSJ article can only be read with a subscription.

Ah you must have looked at a WSJ article before, you get a few goes spread far apart before the shutter comes down!

hmmm · 13-05-2020 10:23pm

100% accuracy in antibody test
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/05/13/exclusive-first-coronavirus-antibody-test-given-approval-public/

"The Telegraph understands that the Department of Health is in negotiations with the Swiss healthcare company Roche to buy millions of the kits."

UK Department of Health FYI.

hmmm · 13-05-2020 10:56pm

Wow - "The goal of Trump's "Operation Warp Speed" -- which may prove impossible to meet -- is to make 100 million doses of the vaccine available by November, 200 million doses by December and 300 million doses by January, a senior administration official has told CNN."

https://www.cnn.com/2020/05/13/politics/white-house-coronavirus-vaccine/index.html

I heard Gottlieb being interviewed earlier in the day, and he said the US consumes about 150 million doses of influenza vaccine every year.

hmmm · 13-05-2020 11:08pm

Disappointing news

https://twitter.com/FakeShowbizNews/status/1260156926136143872

hmmm · 15-05-2020 12:23am

Good news in testing for the Oxford vaccine
https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.05.13.093195v1

A single vaccine prevents Covid in Rhesus Macaques

Also in the summary "Importantly, no evidence of immune-enhanced disease following viral challenge in vaccinated animals was observed."

Ipso · 15-05-2020 7:00am

hmmm wrote: »

Disappointing news

https://twitter.com/FakeShowbizNews/status/1260156926136143872

RIP Human race.

is_that_so · 15-05-2020 9:27am

hmmm wrote: »

100% accuracy in antibody test
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/05/13/exclusive-first-coronavirus-antibody-test-given-approval-public/

"The Telegraph understands that the Department of Health is in negotiations with the Swiss healthcare company Roche to buy millions of the kits."

UK Department of Health FYI.

There were some very vague reference to some news on that front soon, in our briefing on Tuesday. Validation tests and whatnot it sounded like. DeGascun has also spoken of community testing being done by the end of June.

Hmmzis · 15-05-2020 9:38am

https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/05/t-cells-found-covid-19-patients-bode-well-long-term-immunity#

Good news (I think).

Hmmzis · 15-05-2020 11:30am

https://www.cell.com/cell/fulltext/S0092-8674(20)30610-3

Another paper where the researchers have seen existing CD4+ T cells reacting to SARS-cov-2 in rather large proportions. Could this be the explanation for the asymptomatic cases and/or the curiously low household secondary attack rate of this?

https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.04.11.20056010v1
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7104686/

Is this the first paper stating that they've found SARS-cov-2 specific CD8+ T cells? If I recall right those are the ones that can stick around for very long times (decades).

hmmm · 15-05-2020 1:10pm

https://www.sciencemediacentre.org/expert-reaction-to-preprint-on-the-chadox1-ncov-19-vaccine-and-sars-cov-2-pneumonia-in-rhesus-macaques/

Prof Stephen Evans, Professor of Pharmacoepidemiology, London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, said:

Is this good news?

“Very definitely. It is one of the hurdles to be passed by the Oxford vaccine and it has cleared it well. The most important finding to me is the combination of considerable efficacy in terms of viral load and subsequent pneumonia, but no evidence of immune-enhanced disease. The latter has been a concern for vaccines in general, for example with vaccines against respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), and for SARS vaccines. This was a definite theoretical concern for a vaccine against SARS Cov-2 and finding no evidence for it in this study is very encouraging.

hmmm · 16-05-2020 10:44pm

Another vaccine candidate successful in initial animal trials
https://media.medicago.com/webfolder_download/18976bca98bb32b23734fc6f7a85bd9d/2020-05-14-animal-trials-en/4c633d404c108007544f0c2785cae8b1745273c9/2020-05-14-animal-trials-en.pdf

Hmmzis · 17-05-2020 6:58am

hmmm wrote: »

Another vaccine candidate successful in initial animal trials
https://media.medicago.com/webfolder_download/18976bca98bb32b23734fc6f7a85bd9d/2020-05-14-animal-trials-en/4c633d404c108007544f0c2785cae8b1745273c9/2020-05-14-animal-trials-en.pdf

I think this is the 3rd one to pass the animal challenge stage without any signs of AED. Some of the SARS candidates failed at this stage.
Could be a reason to have some cautious optimism about vaccine viability for this after all.

Road-Hog · 17-05-2020 7:46am

Hmmzis wrote: »

I think this is the 3rd one to pass the animal challenge stage without any signs of AED. Some of the SARS candidates failed at this stage.
Could be a reason to have some cautious optimism about vaccine viability for this after all.

Can you explain AED.....and why the positivity ...?

Hmmzis · 17-05-2020 8:04am

Road-Hog wrote: »

Can you explain AED.....and why the positivity ...?

AED - https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antibody-dependent_enhancement

It's a concern for a lot of vaccines, including coronavirus ones. In essence, one would be better off getting the real thing unvaccinated.

The key is to express the highly conserved proteins of the virus from the vaccine to prevent that, while at the same time instructing the immune system to make the antibodies with high neutralization ability.

JTMan · 17-05-2020 7:45pm

Coronavirus vaccine for 30 million in the UK by September if trial succeeds

https://news.sky.com/story/coronavirus-covid-19-vaccine-for-30-million-by-september-if-trial-succeeds-says-sharma-11990039

He said the pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca had finalised a "global licensing agreement" with Oxford University with government support, and added: "This means that if the vaccine is successful AstraZeneca will work to make 30 million doses available by September for the UK as part of an agreement for over 100 million doses in total."

hmmm · 17-05-2020 8:29pm

That'd be incredible if they met that timeline. Too good to be true almost. Big decisions for regulators to make, and from the sounds of it AstraZeneca must be manufacturing it before trials are finished.

There's an interesting political issue here with Brexit due. Would our government offer some sort of concession in return for getting doses before the end of the year, or would the UK ask us to make concessions? Even a few tens of thousands doses offered to front-line health workers/nursing home staff would make a massive difference to how quickly we could safely emerge from lockdowns, and have a massive economic impact.

hmmm · 17-05-2020 8:36pm

https://twitter.com/OutFrontCNN/status/1261441663706075136

JTMan · 17-05-2020 8:54pm

Thanks for sharing that video. Interesting that AstraZeneca/Oxford say they will have "several hundred million" vaccines by the end of the year "but not quite a billion". The UK get the first 100 million doses and who gets the remainder?

If we are close to a billion by the end of the year, then will AstraZeneca/Oxford have 6 billion doses by mid 2021????

hmmm wrote: »

There's an interesting political issue here with Brexit due. Would our government offer some sort of concession in return for getting doses before the end of the year, or would the UK ask us to make concessions?

AstraZeneca are a global company. Don't think Brexit will have any effect on this.

hmmm · 17-05-2020 10:43pm

JTMan wrote: »

AstraZeneca are a global company. Don't think Brexit will have any effect on this.

It will when it is a UK Headquartered company making a vaccine developed by a UK research team in a UK funded university. I expect the UK will demand that the vaccine is made available to UK citizens first, and every other country will fight to get whatever is left over (this all assumes it works).

Decisions around vaccine distribution are going to get brutal:
http://www.rfi.fr/en/france/20200515-macron-to-meet-sanofi-ceo-after-u-turn-on-us-priority-for-covid-19-vaccine

Stheno · 17-05-2020 10:52pm

Hmmzis wrote: »

https://www.cell.com/cell/fulltext/S0092-8674(20)30610-3

Another paper where the researchers have seen existing CD4+ T cells reacting to SARS-cov-2 in rather large proportions. Could this be the explanation for the asymptomatic cases and/or the curiously low household secondary attack rate of this?

https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.04.11.20056010v1
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7104686/

Is this the first paper stating that they've found SARS-cov-2 specific CD8+ T cells? If I recall right those are the ones that can stick around for very long times (decades).

Would someone mind clarifying the difference between T Cells and antibodies?
Are T cells basically defence mechanisms in our bodies that fight infection, and due to common cold coronavirus, the research is finding that those same t.cells are effective in fighting Covid19?

Whereas antibodies are specific to covid19?
Asking as that study estimates that at least 40% of people who had no exposure to the virus had the t cells to fight it, which added to infections is close to herd ability to fight it

Sorry just confused

Mike3287 · 17-05-2020 11:17pm

hmmm wrote: »

https://twitter.com/OutFrontCNN/status/1261441663706075136

Pretty amazing progesss

He says we will know in a month if it works

Ramp up from June to Sept

Hmmzis · 18-05-2020 11:45am

Stheno wrote: »

Would someone mind clarifying the difference between T Cells and antibodies?
Are T cells basically defence mechanisms in our bodies that fight infection, and due to common cold coronavirus, the research is finding that those same t.cells are effective in fighting Covid19?

Yes. They're part of your first line of defence against pathogens. They also tend to be more universal in what they can attack and recognise (multiple proteins of a pathogen in contrast to a specific one).

Stheno wrote: »

Whereas antibodies are specific to covid19?

Yes. That's why the serology tests all use IgG and IgM to check for prior exposure to SARS-cov-2.

Stheno wrote: »

Asking as that study estimates that at least 40% of people who had no exposure to the virus had the t cells to fight it, which added to infections is close to herd ability to fight it

Sorry just confused

Maybe. There are now more papers finding the same results (maybe++).

Hmmzis · 18-05-2020 11:55am

Interesting attack pattern and could be quite useful when considering what places to open up and what places to keep shut:

https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/26/8/20-0633_article

It needs ideal conditions to spread like mad, take that away and it rather sharply nosedives the attack rate.

Sort of makes sense, it's a bat virus, adapted to bats and their environment and how they live. Close contact crowded enclosed environments (bat caves) is all it needs to keep spreading among them. Same for us now, since it managed to jump across to us.

stephenjmcd · 18-05-2020 1:44pm

Early positive signs from Moderna

https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200518005348/en/Moderna-Announces-Positive-Interim-Phase-1-Data

is_that_so · 18-05-2020 1:48pm

Hmmzis wrote: »

Interesting attack pattern and could be quite useful when considering what places to open up and what places to keep shut:

https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/26/8/20-0633_article

It needs ideal conditions to spread like mad, take that away and it rather sharply nosedives the attack rate.

Sort of makes sense, it's a bat virus, adapted to bats and their environment and how they live. Close contact crowded enclosed environments (bat caves) is all it needs to keep spreading among them. Same for us now, since it managed to jump across to us.

The other factor there is how high levels of exercise can also weaken the immune system.

COVID-19: Vaccine/antidote and testing procedures Megathread [Mod Warning - Post #1]

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