Current COVID vaccines may be ineffective by next year: epidemiologists

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Two-thirds of epidemiologists who participated in a recent global survey said that SARS-CoV-2 was mutated, disabling most of the first-generation COVID vaccines, and new or altered candidates. Required.

Entrust People’s Vaccine AllianceIt also reveals that the overwhelming majority (88%) of the 77 epidemiologists surveyed believe that sustained low vaccination in many countries increases the likelihood of developing vaccine-resistant mutations. became.

Variants of concern already South Africa, America, India And Brazil, And Greg Gonzalves, an associate professor at Yale University, said the fact that millions of people around the world are still ill means that new mutations occur every day.

“Sometimes they find niches that make them healthier than their predecessors. These lucky mutants can transmit more efficiently and evade the immune response to previous strains.” He said.

“Unless we vaccinate the world, we will remain exposed to more and more mutations. It avoids our current vaccines and booster shots to deal with them. It may unleash mutations that may be needed. “

Professor Dale Godfrey, Immunology Theme Leader at the Doherty Institute, said: newsGP “We can only guess how the situation will evolve,” but scientists and vaccine makers are preparing.

“At least in the laboratory setting, it is clear that mutants appearing to be more resistant to at least some vaccines are emerging. How vaccinations are emerging in the mutants. The magnitude of the risk this poses is unknown at this time, as there is not enough information about whether it will react, “he said.

“There are some concerns that the AstraZeneca vaccine presents. Much less protection against South African stocks [B.1.351]However, it was a very small study that did not find out if there was still protection against severe illness.

“Although almost or all of the vaccines are less effective in preventing the early stages of illness, they are quite likely to prevent severe illness and death. I think this is likely, but with time and further research. I only know.

At least one real-world study is underway in Brazil. May provide some answers.. All adults in Serrana, a town of 45,000 hit in the state of São Paulo, have been given at least one dose of CoronaVac, developed in China, to track the effects of vaccination on the disease.

Aside from tests to see how effective the vaccine is in reducing infections and serious cases Highly contagious P.1 variant -is this Many cases of reinfection In the Amazon city of Manaus – Brazil’s dominant stockTherefore, this study may also help show how much it may affect the effectiveness of the vaccine.

Infectious disease doctor and microbiologist Associate Professor Paul Griffin said: newsGP The new COVID mutants are “likely” to have some impact on the effectiveness of the vaccines currently in use.

“The natural industry of all living things is that they evolve … so at some point the emergence of escape variants is a fairly likely event,” he said.

“However, while most of the current vaccines are likely to be less effective, there are many so-called” second-generation vaccines “that are less susceptible to the reduced efficacy of new mutants.

‘Our ability to create new vaccines to address escaped variants [has also improved] … the transition from development need to deployment is a relatively rapid process on the order of weeks to months, as there is a fairly clear path for testing vaccines for these variants.

“That’s why I think it’s an event that is likely to happen, but it’s an event that can be managed well.”

Brazil has been hit hard by the coronavirus, and new variants of concern could spread to other countries.

Professor Godfrey is also relatively confident that vaccine developers will be able to combat emerging variants.

“Vaccine makers are already developing and testing new versions of vaccines that are better suited to the variants, which is similar to the way we need to catch up with the influenza variants that emerge each year,” he said. It was.

‘You may need a regular booster for the coronavirus. All the major advances made in the past year with the coronavirus vaccine should allow scientists and pharmaceutical companies to keep up with this competition.

“An important consideration is whether the vaccine maintains protection against serious illness, even if the vaccine is less effective in preventing the early stages of infection. If so, the risk of infection is a cold-like symptomatology. If not, most people will find it much less vulnerable.

If a variant of concern emerges before the development of an effective vaccine, Professor Godfrey believes Australia is a good place to mitigate its spread-for now.

“In a sense, Australia has proven its ability to contain and even eliminate viruses for extended periods of time. If you maintain an approach to dealing with outbreaks, this should also be true for variants,” he said. It was.

‘[But] If these variants are increasingly able to escape vaccine-induced immunity, we may be on the same ship as in other countries. Eliminating the virus and containing it every time it escapes is still important, and for some time it is important, whether it is a subspecies or an original ancestral strain.

“In the meantime, Australia needs to continue to focus on deploying the vaccine we have. For most people, this will be the AstraZeneca vaccine.”

According to Professor Griffin, adopting such an approach worldwide is important to protect Australia from future variants that may be more damaging than current strains.

“The main thing is to try to get over this globally as soon as possible … All the cases we prevent now are to reduce the chances of mutations leading to escape variants,” he said. It was.

“It is the responsibility of all of us to try to reduce the total number we get.”

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