The timing of coronavirus vaccinations will determine the need for new vaccines

• Scientists fear that vaccinations may not proceed quickly enough to prevent the emergence of new, possibly more deadly strains of coronavirus.
• New variants that may elude existing vaccines could create a cycle in which people must continue to receive new coronavirus vaccines for years to come.
• British officials said on Friday that the identified variant may have a higher death rate than the original, although the evidence is “uncertain”.
• Visit the Business Insider homepage for more stories.

The global vaccine rollout is set against the clock: new, more infectious variants of the coronavirus are spreading around the world, and it is unclear to what extent existing vaccines work against these strains.

For now, the vaccines appear to be effective against the strain identified in December in the UK, called B117. But preliminary research suggests the vaccines may be less effective against B1351, the strain identified in South Africa.

“This is one more reason why we should vaccinate as many people as possible,” Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said Thursday. “Viruses won’t mutate unless they replicate, and if you can suppress that with a really good vaccination campaign, then you could actually avoid this deleterious effect that you could get from mutations.”

But the process of gunning has been delayed in many countries. The United States has administered more coronavirus vaccines than any other country, but it distributed only about 19 million doses on Friday.

Scientists fear that the current pace of vaccinations will allow time for too many new strains to emerge. This could lead to a scenario in which scientists have to regularly update vaccines.

Michael Worobey, a viral evolution biologist at the University of Arizona, recently told the BBC that the emergence of new strains of coronavirus could be “a glimpse into the future where we’re going to be in a race. to armaments with this virus, just as we are with the flu. “

It’s also possible that a more deadly strain will appear before most people are vaccinated. In this case, vaccines against the coronavirus may be routinely needed for young people, such as vaccines against polio or measles.

The coronavirus could possibly look like the common cold

Half Point Images / Getty Images

The future of the coronavirus depends heavily on our ability to quickly control transmission. The more immunity people develop – whether through natural infection or through vaccines – the sooner the virus will reach an endemic state, which means that it would circulate perpetually but no longer reach peaks at the pandemic level.

In a recent study, researchers at Emory University and Pennsylvania State University suggested that the coronavirus could possibly resemble a cold that infects people during childhood.

In the most likely scenario of this study, children would contract their first infection with COVID-19, on average, between 3 and 5 years old. Almost all children would be infected by the age of 15. Since pediatric infections are generally mild, it would not be necessary to vaccinate children beforehand. Infants may also benefit from some degree of immunity at birth.

“For the first six months or so of life, or maybe longer if you are breastfeeding, children have maternal antibodies from their mothers, both from the umbilical cord and from breast milk, so there is part of the time in the first year or so of life when children will not be infected with a primary infection, ”Jennie Lavine, lead author of the study, told Insider.

The researchers estimated that the re-infections would be even milder – and may even boost immunity against related coronavirus strains.

If vaccinations go ahead quickly, the New York Times reported, the virus could reach this endemic state in as little as six months to a year. Fauci recently estimated that life could return to normal in the fall if 70% to 85% of Americans were vaccinated by the end of summer.

But based on observed patterns of other human coronaviruses, the researchers’ model suggested that the new coronavirus would most likely become endemic within five to 10 years. Without prompt vaccinations, in other words, outbreaks could persist for some time.

Update vaccines for new variants

Jose M. Osorio / Chicago Tribune via AP

Vaccines trigger the production of specific antibodies to the virus, so if people are exposed to the virus after being vaccinated, those same antibodies recognize the virus and destroy it before it has a chance to widely replicate.

In an ideal scenario, coronavirus vaccines would protect against all strains of the virus for several years.

But scientists fear the new coronavirus variants are different enough from the original to evade antibodies developed in response to vaccines. If this happens, scientists may have to constantly change the genetic instructions of vaccines to overcome new strains. The process is not necessarily difficult, but it would mean that people would need follow-up plans.

“If we ever have to change the vaccine, it’s not something very expensive,” Fauci said Thursday. “We can do it, given the platforms we have.”

But a scenario in which new strains force people to be revaccinated regularly – as is already the case with the flu vaccine – becomes more likely with the time it takes to get current vaccines in. arms.

However, it is also possible that other layers of immunity protect people against emerging strains. White blood cells called T cells and B cells also remember foreign invaders, often for longer periods of time than antibodies. A recent study suggested that recovered coronavirus patients had robust T and B cell immunity for at least eight months. A study on SARS, which is caused by a genetically similar coronavirus, showed that recovered patients had immunity to T cells 17 years after their infection.

Deadlier strain could make coronavirus vaccines routine

Kirsty O’Connor / POOL / AFP via Getty Images

By vaccinating people quickly, public health officials hope to avoid the worst-case scenario: the emergence of a more deadly strain of coronavirus.

“The things that we have to keep looking that would prevent this from becoming a very benign and endemic thing that does not require vaccination would be if the virus were to change in some way, so that infections in childhood were getting more serious, ”Lavine said.

In that case, she added, all young people should get the vaccine before they get their first coronavirus infection.

There is already some evidence that the British coronavirus strain could be more deadly than the original. UK chief scientific adviser Patrick Vallance said on Friday the new variant could have a death rate up to 30% higher in certain age groups, although the evidence remains “uncertain”.

The good news, however, is that existing coronavirus vaccines appear to address this.

“From what we have seen so far, the variants described do not alter the ability of the neutralizing antibodies caused by the vaccination to neutralize the virus,” Moderna chief medical officer Tal Zaks said during the presentation. JP Morgan Healthcare conference earlier this month.

But this makes the task of vaccinating people all the more urgent.

“Everyone will probably be infected someday,” Lavine said. “Let’s do an infection after the vaccination so that you don’t get really sick.”