This hasn't gotten a ton of publicity, but it looks like the long-awaited "super vaccine" may now be within reach:
Within weeks, scientists at the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research expect to announce that they have developed a vaccine that is effective against COVID-19 and all its variants, even Omicron, as well as previous SARS-origin viruses that have killed millions of people worldwide.
....Walter Reed’s Spike Ferritin Nanoparticle COVID-19 vaccine, or SpFN, completed animal trials earlier this year with positive results. Phase 1 of human trials, wrapped up this month, again with positive results that are undergoing final review, Dr. Kayvon Modjarrad, director of Walter Reed’s infectious diseases branch, said in an exclusive interview with Defense One on Tuesday. The new vaccine will still need to undergo phase 2 and phase 3 trials.
There are several caveats here. The first, obviously, is that the new vaccine has to undergo Phase 2 and Phase 3 trials before it can be approved for the general population. The second is that even if it works, we don't yet know how effective it is. And the third is that we don't know how long it lasts.
Ironically, testing is being delayed because so many people are already vaxed or have gotten COVID. This makes it hard to find a proper test population, especially since the unvaxed are mostly people who don't want to get vaxed and sure as hell don't want to be guinea pigs for a new vaccine. It's always something, isn't it?
Wouldn't that be something? Bad news for the profits of Big Pharma would just be the cherry on top of the sundae.
Hmmm...Can't edit it or delete it. Well... just go to the post about Walter Reed and Covid, and I'll put it there where it was meant to go.
Walter Reed would no doubt have to enter into one or more production agreements with “big pharma” I rather doubt they possess considerable production capacity of their own.
Wouldn’t you want to test it on people who had already been vaccinated? Since most of us who want it already have been vaccinated wouldn’t you want to see how it affected people who have already been vaccinated with various vaccines? If it gives more protection than just another booster?
My guess is it becomes difficult to differentiate between the risk reduction from the test vaccine and the risk reduction from the vaccine, booster, and/or infection immunity particularly if any of those are fairly recent events for the potential test subject.
Novavax has a similar type of vaccine, but the the standard spike protein. The problem they've been having has been in production with protein purity.
(ok, not the best science link, but pops up in Google: https://www.politico.com/news/2021/10/19/novavax-vaccine-rush-process-global-campaign-516298)
That's also why our approval process can take time--even with vaccines that look good in trials.
Testing for safety can proceed no matter what the history of the subjects. In fact the more varied the better. Testing for efficacy doesn't have to be absolutely rigorous if it's as good as reputed.
"Unlike existing vaccines, Walter Reed’s SpFN uses a soccer ball-shaped protein with 24 faces for its vaccine, which allows scientists to attach the spikes of multiple coronavirus strains on different faces of the protein."
So it sounds like (to a layperson with no real idea) this vaccine is more likely to be effective against future variants as well. Any experts here care to weigh in on that?
To most laypeople it probably sounds like playing soccer will protect them from Covid.
😉
The goal, by presenting many different spike proteins, with different heads, but all have basically the same stalks, is to get the immune system to target the stalk, and therefore be "universal". Generating antibodies to the stalk protein in one thing, getting them to actually neutralize the virus in the body is another. This presumes the stalk will stay conserved during viral replication.
Well that sort of sounds like the scientists explanation of why vaccine immunity with existing vaccine will be better than natural immunity for future variants. Because they thought the existing spike protein was so crucial to the virus that no future variant could change that much and still be effective. Thus immunity focusing on just the spike , which cannot be changed much in an effective variant, will be better than natural immunity which is more diffusely focused on the whole virus .
So the vaccine immunity was supposed to be " variant proof " more than natural.
Well how did that theory turn out ? Omicron says hello .
Then by midjanuary Omicron will say goodbye
ummm...no
Ummm yes. Are you too retarded to see it???
It would of course be far worse to obscure the origin of this vaccine, but somehow I suspect coming from the US military and as such part of the ever-loved “military industrial complex” will not engender warm fuzzies among a number of groups.
Why not?
We've trained on this since WWI. The personnel KNOW it has to be taken into account. The military of just about all countries are the most vaccinated groups in the world.
Israel has just about everyone on "stand by" for military service and they go ahead and roll up their sleeves whenever its necessary for whatever they KNOW is out there, as well as a few things they SUSPECT are out there.
Government sponsored research happens all over the world -especially in Universities..
The MAGATs wear cammo, wrap around sunglasses, (mirrored), have web belts for extra mags, and chest plates, along with other military styled gear. You mean they won't act like the military does and get the shots??????
Indeed. And I suspect the “MAGAts” would not be alone.
Lol, magot what??? Like those globalist matter. It's to late. Omicron is the end of the pandemic.
Anti vaxxers will still NOT take it.
Bad thing about the Omicron varant was that it settle in the Bronia where the b and t cells for post infection immunity didn't recognize this variant.
Another facet tot his was that for LONG COVID they are finding the virus in the heart, and brain of dead victims
https://www.detroitnews.com/story/life/wellness/2021/12/26/study-coronavirus-can-persist-months-after-traversing-entire-body/9019634002/
SEVERAL {snip}
The coronavirus that causes COVID-19, SARS-CoV-2, can spread within days from the airways to the heart, brain and almost every organ system in the body, where it may persist for months, a study found....
“This is remarkably important work,” said Ziyad Al-Aly, director of the clinical epidemiology center at the Veterans Affairs St. Louis Health Care System in Missouri, who has led separate studies into the long-term effects of COVID-19. “For a long time now, we have been scratching our heads and asking why long COVID seems to affect so many organ systems. This paper sheds some light, and may help explain why long COVID can occur even in people who had mild or asymptomatic acute disease.”
.....Immune response
The less-efficient viral clearance in tissues outside the pulmonary system may be related to a weak immune response outside the respiratory tract, the authors said.
{snip}
So OUITSIDE of the lungs the nature immune response is weaker than in the lungs.
THIS is what concerns me. COVID is now traversing the body in some people.
Its bad enough that Omicron is so different as a mutation but once it gets outside the lungs the bodies natural responses are not near as good as they would be if the infection were in the lungs.
If what the docs at Walter Reed are saying comes to fruition that should end the discussion about post infection immunity unless something NEW pops up.
We can hope
73%+ of adults are already vaccinated. Your point is irrelevant.
Hopefully they set up in Africa and vaccinate everyone there first.
Can they make it in horse paste form? Maybe then they'd get some unvaccinated people interested in participating.
Isn’t getting any easier to find test subjects: https://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/coronavirus/1-in-50-manhattan-residents-infected-with-covid-in-the-last-week/3470148/?amp
This goes along with research reportedly taking place in Japan.
At this point anyone not vaccinated needs to be isolated.
After all the rports about animals acting as COVID reservoirs, having a vaccine that works against ALL variants will be far better than getting ill, taking a chance on DYING or tying up medical facilities (because we gotta own the libs).
Otherwise I'm beginning to feel like Justin (they can all die)
We just need to make this like the myriad of other child hood vaccines we have to take. Do it annually if need be.
Now we still have to wait to see how this works of course but it sounds hopeful
I wish I didn't think that, but I'm all out of tolerance. On to ambivalence!
And don't forget... who is going to formulate it, fill it in vials, and package it? Are they going to take over all those companies filling for J&J and AZ? This should be fun to watch. I'm guessing Pfizer and Moderna aren't interested.
By the way... since the Army has a super vaccine, don't you think they also have a super virus? Just like the Chinese had this one on the shelf!
So many people have gotten covid or been vaccinated that cannot test it easily ? Nonsense.
First, almost everyone is either vaccinated or has had covid , or will after this omicron wave . My guess is that we might be down to 1 or 2% then who are both unvaccinated and never had covid , and a huge percentage of those vaccinated will have also had covid.
The large majority of those who are unvaccinated and who never had a CONFIRMED case of covid will , in reality, have still had covid , but just did not know they did , as asymptomatic or very mild symptoms. And those with such mild or zero symptoms may never have developed antibodies or they wore off quick , but still have immunity from t cells and b cells .
So how are they going to find those who have no immunity to test it on? Are they going to do some expensive test to check for t cells? Is there one ?
And say they could. What good does that do? What do I care if you show that this new vaccine works great for those who are never vaccinated and never infected, if only 1 or 2% are left in that category. All that shows is it would have been a great vaccine if available at the start , not now.
No, what we need are trials showing if the vaccine is effective for those who have been already vaccinated, or been infected, or both. Because that is now just about everyone.
Question is whether this new vaccine can " reset " your immunity from what you already have to focus more efficiently on future variants. Or if original antigenic sin ( look it up) prevents that.
Thoughtless is factless, as usual. Though he is full of ... guesses.
It’s for Africa.
It's so inconvenient that the US is the only country on Earth. If only there were some others.
Gee, I wonder if there might be unvaccinated people in other countries? Like maybe second or third world countries. You know, the ones that haven't been able to get current vaccines because either they don't have the refrigeration capability or first world countries have hoarded the supply for infinite boosters.
https://newsroom.uw.edu/news/scientists-identify-antibodies-can-neutralize-omicron
{SNIP}
*****Antibodies from people who had previously been infected****** and those who had received the Sputnik V or Sinopharm vaccines as well as a single dose of Johnson & Johnson *****had little or no ability to block – or “neutralize” – the omicron variant's entry into cells*******. Antibodies from people who had received two doses of the Moderna, Pfizer/BioNTech, and AstraZeneca vaccines retained some neutralizing activity, albeit reduced by 20- to 40-fold, much more than any other variants.
{SNIP}
And this story
https://www.cnn.com/2021/12/27/health/covid-kids-hospitals/index.html
{snip}
A five-fold increase in pediatric admissions in New York City this month. Close to double the numbers admitted in Washington, DC. And nationwide, on average, pediatric hospitalizations are up 48% in just the past week
{snip}
Children are an easy target for the virus, Dr. Juan Salazar, physician in chief at Connecticut Children's Medical Center in Hartford, told CNN
"It's affecting larger communities and it's certainly affecting children in a way that we hadn't seen before. And that's new compared to last year," he said. Only about a third of eligible children, ages 5 and older, are vaccinated in Connecticut, Salazar estimated.
"Because of that, the virus has found a niche.
{snip}
Interesting but wait.. Whats next?
Who is saying that some countries have as little as 5% or less of their populations vaccinated - but we have ENOUGH vaccine supply that by the end of the year we COULD vaccinate everyone but we won't. It will just continue to ping pong around, constantly mutating
But int he story I linked to above there's this little gem
{snip}
“The main questions we were trying to answer were: how has this constellation of mutations in the spike protein of the omicron variant affected its ability to bind to cells and to evade the immune system’s antibody responses,” Veesler said.
Veesler and his colleagues speculate that omicron's large number of mutations might have accumulated during a prolonged infection in someone with a weakened immune system or by the virus jumping from humans to an animal species and back again.
{snip}
All you anti vaxxers out here? Why don't you book your own cruises
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/petri-dishes-of-covid-cdc-faces-call-to-pause-cruises-as-nearly-90-ships-report-coronavirus-cases-11640725833
{snip}
As of Tuesday, there were 89 cruise ships with COVID-19 cases reported, according to the CDC. All but three of those ships were under CDC investigation. Aside from Carnival CCL, -0.24% and Royal Caribbean RCL, -0.27%, COVID-19 cases also occurred on ships operated by Disney DIS, +1.57%, Norwegian Cruise Line NCLH, -1.04% and Viking Cruises.
{snip}
I won't give you guesses. I'll just post the news and the science
Sorry this isn't over
I still suspect Faucci is waiting until June/July for the next "big thing" in this pandemic. This variant came way too early