The recent surge in Covid-19 is making vaccine makers to have a rethink - page 5.

I could remember when the Corona Virus started making the world to be in a turbulent state of rest. America shut down in March 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, there was a pervading sense that the situation was probably or hopefully temporary. After all, efforts were already underway to develop a vaccine. It was just a matter of time until normalcy would return.

But 17 months later, a return to "normal" is nowhere in sight. Frightening new mutant strains like the delta variant and the lambda variant have emerged, more infectious and possibly more dangerous than their antecedents. Early evidence indicates that, while existing vaccines stop patients from getting severely ill if infected, they do not prevent the infected from transmitting the disease. At the very least, it is theoretically possible that mutant variants could create problems for people who want their inoculations to be effective.

In other words, the vaccines weren't enough. Humanity anxiously awaited development of the first COVID-19 vaccines throughout 2020; now that those vaccines aren't enough to permanently halt COVID-19, it would appear that vaccine manufacturers are pivoting their strategy. But as to what they have planned, pharmaceutical companies aren't being entirely transparent — or perhaps they aren't sure.

"As SARS-CoV-2 continues to evolve, Pfizer and BioNTech are continuing our work to understand long term immunity, the need for booster shots, and any threat from circulating or new variants of concern to vaccine protection," a Pfizer spokesperson told Salon by email. The company said that the existing body of research and evidence suggests that the circulating variants do not escape their COVID-19 vaccine, adding that they continue to perform clinical trials at various stages for a third dose of their currently two-dose BNT162b2 vaccine, with possibly hopeful results. That vaccine, widely known as the "Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine," is effective in preventing COVID-19; two doses of it significantly strengthens the body's ability to avoid severe disease and hospitalizations.

The company also communicated to Salon that, broadly speaking, they plan on keeping tabs on emerging variants and waning immunity so that they can prepare new products if necessary. "It is, in part, why we chose a vaccine technology with the flexibility that allows us to both provide boosting doses if needed and to address potential changes in the virus," Pfizer explained.

The biotechnology in question is known as an mRNA vaccine, and it describes the type of inoculation developed by both Pfizer and Moderna (which did not respond to Salon's request for comment). Traditional vaccines work by introducing a weakened or dead pathogen (an organism that causes disease) into the body. The immune system becomes familiar with the pathogens by being exposed to them and, like a soldier participating in war games, learns how to fight a real enemy through training with a facsimile. More specifically, the immune system learns how to recognize antigens (a toxic or foreign substance on an antigen) and produce antibodies to destroy the pathogens associated with them.

https://www.salon.com/2021/08/12/vaccine-makers-future-strategy-delta/

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