Summary: No vaccines exist that protect people against infections by coronaviruses, including SARS-CoV-2, which causes COVID-19, or the ones that cause SARS and MERS. As COVID-19 continues to wreak havoc, many labs around the world have developed a laser-like focus on understanding the virus and finding the best strategy for stopping it. Researchers now suggest that the approach they took for a MERS virus vaccine may also work against SARS-CoV-2. <\/p>\n\n\n\n This week in mBio<\/em>, a journal of the American Society of \nMicrobiology, a team of interdisciplinary researchers describes a \npromising vaccine candidate against the MERS virus. Since the MERS \n(Middle East Respiratory Syndrome) outbreak began in 2012, more than 850\n people have died, and studies suggest the virus has a case fatality \nrate of more than 30%.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In the new paper, the researchers suggest that the approach they took\n for a MERS virus vaccine may also work against SARS-CoV-2. The \nvaccine’s delivery method is an RNA virus called parainfluenza virus 5 \n(PIV5), which is believed to cause a condition known as kennel cough in \ndogs but appears harmless to people. The researchers added an extra gene\n to the virus so that infected cells would produce the S, or spike, \nglycoprotein known to be involved in MERS infections.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “We know people have been exposed to PIV5, but it seems to be an \ninnocuous virus in humans,” said pediatric pulmonologist and coronavirus\n expert Paul McCray, M.D., at the University of Iowa, in Iowa City, who \nco-led the new study with virologist Biao He, Ph.D., at the University \nof Georgia, in Athens. “PIV5 doesn’t seem to cause a cytopathic effect.”\n The MERS virus cannot replicate in mice, so to test the vaccine McCray \ndeveloped a mouse model that mimics human infections. The mice had been \ngenetically engineered to express DPP4, the protein used by the MERS \nvirus as an entry point for human cells.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Lab tests showed that a single dose of the vaccine, given \nintranasally, effectively caused infected cells to produce the S \nprotein, which in turn triggered immune responses against the protein in\n the animal host.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Four weeks after the mice received the vaccine, they were exposed to a\n strain of the MERS virus, adapted to the mice to cause a lethal \ninfection. The MERS virus was also given to groups of mice that had \nreceived a different PIV5 vaccine — one without the genes for the S \nprotein — or an intramuscular vaccine with inactivated MERS virus.<\/p>\n\n\n\n All the mice immunized with the modified PIV5 virus survived MERS \nvirus infection. In contrast, all the mice immunized with the PIV5 \nwithout S died from the infection. The intramuscular vaccine of \ninactivated MERS virus only protected 25% of the mice from a lethal \ninfection. The mice that received inactivated MERS virus showed \nabove-average levels of eosinophils, white blood cells that indicate \ninfection or inflammation. This connection raises a safety concern for \ninactivated MERS virus as a potential vaccine, said He. The study \ndemonstrates that an intranasal, PIV5-based vaccine is effective against\n MERS in mice, said He, and should be investigated for its potential \nagainst other dangerous coronaviruses, including SARS-CoV-2.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “We’re quite interested in using viruses as gene delivery vehicles,” \nsaid McCray, who has also investigated similar strategies as a way to \ntreat cystic fibrosis. Now, like colleagues around the world, McCray and\n He have both focused their research efforts on SARS-CoV-2, taking a \nsimilar tack to working with mouse models of infection and testing \nvaccines.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Finding an effective vaccine against the coronavirus that causes COVID-19 is a race against time, McCray said. “One hundred percent of the population is not going to be exposed to the virus the first time around, which means there will be more people to infect when it comes again,” he said. “We don’t know yet if people get lasting immunity from the SARS-CoV-2 infection, so it’s important to think about ways to protect the population.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Story Source:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Materials<\/a> provided by American Society for Microbiology<\/strong><\/a>. Note: Content may be edited for style and length.<\/em>,<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Date: April 7, 2020 Source: American Society for Microbiology Source 2: www.sciencedaily.com Summary: No vaccines exist that protect people against infections by coronaviruses, including SARS-CoV-2, which causes COVID-19, or the ones that cause SARS and MERS. As COVID-19 continues to wreak havoc, many labs around the world have developed a laser-like focus on understanding the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":705,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-704","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"aioseo_notices":[],"yoast_head":"\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.potentialloops.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/images-1.jpg\")
No vaccines exist that protect people against infections by coronaviruses, including SARS-CoV-2, which causes COVID-19, or the ones that cause SARS and MERS. As COVID-19 continues to wreak havoc, many labs around the world have developed a laser-like focus on understanding the virus and finding the best strategy for stopping it. <\/h3>\n\n\n\n