Monthly Archives: September 2022

Good evening. Im Karen Kaplan, and its Tuesday, Sept. 20. Heres the latest on whats happening with the coronavirus in California and beyond.

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People arent dying of COVID anymore.

It may seem that way, especially when President Biden disses masks on 60 Minutes and tells a national TV audience that the pandemic is over.

But when a friend made that observation to Erick Morales recently, he begged to differ.

Morales own mother, Alejandra Gutirrez, died of COVID-19 in June at the age of 59.

Gutirrez was vaccinated and boosted. She was careful, and so were her adult children, who wore masks when they were with her and avoided social situations that might result in a coronavirus exposure.

But Gutirrez was unlucky. She came down with ovarian cancer during the first pandemic winter, and despite multiple treatments, it spread to her brain in January.

The cancer weakened her, but it wasnt what killed her. She caught COVID-19 in late May and struggled to breathe. In her final days, she lost the ability to speak.

Gutirrez was one of the more than 400 people who died of COVID-19 each day in the U.S. during June, July and August, according to data from the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center. Even now, with the second Omicron wave ebbing, COVID-19 is still killing an average of 425 Americans per day, the center reports.

In January 2021, when the first COVID-19 vaccines were being rolled out, the countrys daily death toll exceeded 3,300. A number like 425 is a definite improvement. But its a lot higher than the handful of cases many of us presume it to be.

For the record:

10:41 p.m. Sept. 21, 2022A previous version of this newsletter said that in January 2021, the countrys daily COVID-19 death toll exceeded 23,000. That was the weekly death toll, which averaged out to more than 3,300 deaths per day.

In fact, COVID-19 is still one of the countrys leading causes of death. As of Tuesday, it would rank fifth, between strokes (439 deaths per day) and chronic lower respiratory diseases (418 deaths per day).

If that seems hard to believe, how about this: In Los Angeles County alone, nearly 800 people died of COVID-19 between May and July. Thats roughly 60% higher than during the same three months last year, when the county recorded nearly 500 deaths.

At a time when vaccines, boosters, medications and antibody treatments are plentiful, when hospitals have the bandwidth to care for patients who are seriously ill, and when, as White House COVID-19 Response Coordinator Dr. Ashish Jha said, most COVID-19 deaths are preventable, youve got to wonder: Who is dying of COVID-19 now?

My colleagues Emily Alpert Reyes and Aida Ylanan have the answer.

It turns out that Gutirrez was a something of an anomaly. Recent COVID-19 deaths have been heavily concentrated among senior citizens.

Alejandra Morales-Gutirrez and brother Erick Morales lost their mother, Alejandra Gutirrez, to COVID-19 in June.

(Christina House / Los Angeles Times)

In California, about half of those who died this summer were at least 80 years old. Another third were people between the ages of 65 and 79.

Throughout California, Black residents had the highest COVID-19 death rate, pretty much regardless of age. And in L.A. County, men have been more likely to die than women.

Gutirrez was a typical COVID-19 victim in one respect: She already had a health problem that made her vulnerable to a serious case of COVID-19. For people like her, an encounter with the coronavirus can be like dry brush encountering a lit match, said Michael T. Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota.

It doesnt cause the high temperatures, or the winds, or the low humidity, he said. But nothing happens until you throw that SARS-CoV-2 virus into the mix.

Here in L.A. County, nearly half of the people who died of COVID-19 between May and July were contending with at least three health conditions before the coronavirus came along, and almost all had at least one. Those conditions werent necessarily as serious as ovarian cancer; typical examples include obesity, diabetes, high blood pressure and cardiovascular disease.

In addition, residents of poorer neighborhoods were more likely to die of COVID-19 than residents of wealthier ones.

But COVID-19 can kill anyone. In recent months, hundreds of young and middle-aged adults have died of the disease, as have four minors. And so have 412 Californians over the age of 12 who were vaccinated (including 260 who were also boosted), although they represent less than 0.01% of state residents whove gotten the shots.

The Omicron variant especially the BA.5 subvariant has been infecting so many people that youve surely encountered tons of people whove recently recovered from a bout with COVID-19. More than in years past, it probably feels like COVID-19 survivors are everywhere. And they are.

But the number of infections is so high that even with a low mortality rate, the death count is still substantial. Its just that in a country eager to move on from the pandemic and stop thinking about things such as masks and booster shots, these deaths arent getting the attention they deserve.

The elderly, the immunocompromised, and the unvaccinated or under-vaccinated they are the ones that account for the vast majority of deaths due to COVID-19, said Dr. Thomas Yadegar, medical director of the intensive care unit at Providence Cedars-Sinai Tarzana Medical Center.

Weve sacrificed the lives of our most vulnerable for our own convenience, he said.

California cases and deaths as of 4:55 p.m. on Tuesday:

Track Californias coronavirus spread and vaccination efforts including the latest numbers and how they break down with our graphics.

Its no secret that the United States had a less-than-textbook response to the COVID-19 pandemic. It turns out we had plenty of company, even among wealthy nations that were expected to be more prepared.

So says a group of experts convened by the medical journal Lancet. In a report released last week, they made it abundantly clear that they were not impressed with the worlds efforts to rise to the occasion.

The Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation estimates the pandemics global death toll at around 17.2 million, a staggering figure that is both a profound tragedy and a massive global failure at multiple levels, the members of the Lancet COVID-19 Commission wrote.

And theres plenty of blame to go around, they added: Too many governments have failed to adhere to basic norms of institutional rationality and transparency, too many people often influenced by misinformation have disrespected and protested against basic public health precautions, and the worlds major powers have failed to collaborate to control the pandemic.

That failure to collaborate came in many forms, the commission members wrote. It started with Chinas delay in notifying the world about the patients in Wuhan who had come down with a mysterious type of pneumonia that wasnt caused by any known virus. It continued with multiple countries failure to coordinate their efforts to contain and suppress the novel virus, or to figure out what those efforts ought to entail.

Wealthy countries didnt do enough to ensure that low- and middle-income countries had the money they needed to procure personal protective equipment, ventilators, test kits and other necessary supplies. And when there were limited supplies of medicines and vaccines, rich nations did not share equally with poor ones, the report says.

Countries did not gather timely, accurate, and systematic data on infections, deaths, viral variants and other factors that would be important to know if you wanted to get a pandemic under control, the experts wrote.

The World Health Organization didnt want to get ahead of the science with good reason but it took too long to acknowledge that people with asymptomatic infections could spread the coronavirus without realizing it, and that the virus spreads mainly through the air. As a result, the WHO was slow to advocate policy responses commensurate with the actual dangers of the virus, the report says.

And no one at any level has had much success combating the extensive misinformation and disinformation campaigns on social media, the report adds.

Thats not even a complete list of the problems the Lancet commission identified.

The commission was established in July 2020 with the aim of finding ways to help countries work together more effectively. Its 28 members are experts in disciplines such as epidemiology, vaccinology, economics and public policy.

Right off the bat, the report explains that you cant suppress an infectious disease without prosociality, which means prioritizing the good of society as a whole over the interests of individuals. Unfortunately, the growing gap between the haves and have-nots in many countries has undermined any sense of collective purpose.

In the U.S. and other countries, an unwillingness to put the interests of society as a whole ahead of the interests of individuals has undermined efforts to get the pandemic under control, experts say.

(Cedar Attanasio / Associated Press)

In the United States and elsewhere, false claims about COVID-19 vaccines and debunked treatments such as ivermectin, among other things, were spread by politicians and cable television personalities for the sake of partisanship, not public health. In the U.S. alone, unfounded anti-vaccine sentiment has led to as many as 200,000 preventable deaths, and this anti-science movement has globalised with tragic consequences, the commission wrote.

We cant go back in time and do everything over. But the commission offered advice on where to go from here.

For starters, it said its not too late for countries to get serious about the basics, including mass vaccination, accessible testing, and treatment. They should be accompanied by policies that support people who need to isolate, as well as common-sense preventive measures such as mask mandates in certain settings. Most importantly, the commission wrote, these efforts should be implemented on a sustainable basis, rather than as a reactive policy that is abruptly turned on and off.

To make sure the pandemic ends as quickly as possible, countries should work together to track new coronavirus variants and quickly assess the risks they pose.

To be better prepared for the next pandemic threat, the commission advised countries to strengthen their own health systems and make sure everyone has access to medical care. In addition, they should shore up their disease surveillance and reporting systems, emphasize the importance of preventive health and emergency preparedness, improve their public health communication strategies, and more aggressively fight health disinformation, according to the report.

Countries should invest a lot more in the World Health Organization and come up with better ways to cooperate and coordinate and they should do it now so theyll be ready when the next infectious disease threat inevitably arises.

That said, countries need to work harder to prevent that next outbreak from happening, the commission said. That means they should come up with more uniform rules about the trade of both domestic and wild animals, and make sure theyre enforced. They should also give the WHO more authority to keep tabs on research programs involving dangerous pathogens to make sure that biosafety rules are followed.

Whether anyone will follow this advice remains to be seen. The commission didnt exactly strike an optimistic tone as it wrapped up its report:

The lack of ambition in the global response to COVID-19 is like that of other pressing global challenges, such as the climate emergency; the loss of global biodiversity; the pollution of air, land, and water; the persistence of extreme poverty in the midst of plenty; and the large-scale displacement of people as a result of conflicts, poverty, and environmental stress.

See the latest on Californias vaccination progress with our tracker.

Another pandemic precaution has bit the dust: As of Saturday, California no longer requires unvaccinated workers at healthcare facilities, schools and other congregate settings to get tested for coronavirus infections once a week.

Those weekly surveillance tests used to be an important part of the states pandemic response. But considering where we are in the outbreak, the tests arent nearly as useful as they once were.

Most state residents now have some immunity through vaccination or a past infection or both so they face less risk of becoming seriously ill. Plus, the Omicron subvariants spread so quickly that weekly testing isnt enough to slow it down, said Dr. Toms Aragn, director of the California Department of Public Health.

Los Angeles County may drop one of its rules by the end of the month if coronavirus case rates continue to decline. If the county sees fewer than 100 cases a week per 100,000 residents roughly 1,400 cases per day masks will no longer be required on public transportation or in hubs such as airports and train stations.

As of Tuesday, the county was averaging 1,735 cases per day over the last week, according to The Times tracker. County Public Health Director Barbara Ferrer said we could hit the lower threshold by the end of the month.

Should that happen, the county would also stop recommending that everyone wear a mask indoors in public settings such as grocery stores and offices. Face coverings would still be strongly recommended in high-risk settings for people who are older, unvaccinated, live in high-poverty areas or have health conditions that make them more susceptible to a severe case of COVID-19. Otherwise, the decision about covering up would be a matter of personal preference.

Masks will continue to be required in healthcare settings, correctional facilities, cooling centers and a handful of other places.

California isnt the only place seeing pandemic improvements. The World Health Organization says the number of new infections is dropping in every part of the globe.

The WHOs latest weekly report counted 3.1 million new cases, a 28% drop from the previous week. Deaths also fell by 22%, to just over 11,000 the lowest worldwide death toll since March 2020.

We are not there yet, but the end is in sight, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said Wednesday.

Dr. Anthony Fauci, the top infectious disease expert in the U.S., agreed Monday that were heading in that direction. But unlike Biden, he walked back Bidens assessment that the pandemic phase of the outbreak was already behind us.

It is likely that we will see another variant emerge in the late fall or winter, Fauci said Monday during a talk at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.

Dr. Eric Topol, a professor of molecular medicine at Scripps Research in La Jolla, schooled the president as well.

We all wish that were true, Topol wrote in an an op-ed. But unfortunately, that is a fantasy right now. All the data tell us the virus is not contained. Far too many people are dying and suffering. And new, worrisome variants are on the horizon.

An experimental vaccine may help us stay ahead of those new variants. Instead of focusing solely on the spike protein, which has proved adept at mutating in ways that reduce vaccine effectiveness, the new shots also target a far more stable nucleocapsid protein.

Although the vaccines design was based on an early coronavirus strain first seen in Wuhan, it was effective against both the Delta and Omicron variants and when tested in mice and hamsters. Its still several steps away from being tested in humans, but scientists are optimistic that it could lead the way to a one-size-fits-all vaccine that provides lasting protection without needing to be tweaked on a regular basis like the flu shot.

Its a great idea, said Dr. Paul Offit, a virologist and immunologist at the University of Pennsylvania who wasnt involved in the research. You could have argued that we should have done this at the beginning.

And finally, the Chinese government is facing more complaints about its zero-COVID strategy. Earlier this month it was a magnitude 6.8 earthquake in Sichuan province that triggered protests because millions of residents in lockdown were prevented from fleeing their seriously damaged homes.

This week it was a fatal bus crash in the middle of the night in Guizhou province. Forty-seven passengers were being transported to a quarantine facility outside the capital city, Guiyang; 27 of them died.

Critics went online and accused the government of moving the passengers for political purposes, not public health ones. They speculated that residents were being taken outside the city limits so Guiyang wouldnt have to report any new illnesses.

Will this ever end? one commenter asked. Is there scientific validity to hauling people to quarantine, one car after another?

In addition, residents in some neighborhoods complained of hunger after food deliveries were missed, a mistake local officials attributed to their lack of experience and inappropriate methods. The local zoo worried it would run out of food for its animals and appealed to the public for donations of pork, chicken, apples, watermelons, carrots and other produce.

Food shortages are also a problem in Ghulja, a city in Chinas far western Xinjiang region where the Uyghur population is used to harsh treatment from the government.

After more than 40 days of lockdown, hungry and frustrated residents went online to share videos of empty refrigerators and feverish children. In some cases, people who have ingredients to make bread havent been able to bake their dough because authorities wont let them go outside to use their backyard ovens.

Nyrola Elima, Uyghur from Ghulja who no longer lives there, told the Associated Press that her father was sharing one tomato each day with his 93-year-old mother, and that her aunt was desperate for milk for her toddler grandson. Her account could not be independently verified, but her descriptions were in line with videos posted by others.

Chinese censors worked to remove those posts from social media, though some reappeared. Six people were arrested for spreading rumors about the lockdown.

Todays question comes from readers who want to know: Whats the difference between being fully vaccinated and being up to date?

The CDC considers someone to be fully vaccinated if theyve finished their primary series of COVID-19 shots. For Comirnaty (the vaccine from Pfizer and BioNTech), Spikevax (the one from Moderna) and the (relatively) new offering from Novavax, that means two shots given between three and eight weeks apart. Only a single dose is required for the Johnson & Johnson vaccine.

But immunity wanes and new variants spark fresh COVID-19 surges. That means being fully vaccinated is just the beginning.

The immune system needs a refresher course from time to time, and a booster shot provides one. But rather than change the definition of fully vaccinated, the CDC instead said people who got the boosters recommended for them were up to date with their vaccinations.

If youre at least 12 years old, that means getting a new bivalent booster shot to (hopefully) bolster your protection against BA.4 and BA.5. To be eligible, you must be fully vaccinated and not have had a COVID-19 vaccine in at least two months or a coronavirus infection in at least three months. Once you get a bivalent booster, youll be considered up to date regardless of how many booster shots youve had (or missed) in the past.

We want to hear from you. Email us your coronavirus questions, and well do our best to answer them. Wondering if your questions already been answered? Check out our archive here.

(Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)

The woman at Hermosa Beach in the picture above is Sandhya Kambhampati, a colleague of mine on the Data Desk. She caught COVID-19 very early in the pandemic, then became one of the first long COVID patients her doctors had encountered. Last year, she wrote a first-person account of what it took to convince them her symptoms were real.

They finally came around, but Kambhampati still struggled. Eventually, at her doctors insistence, she took a leave from work so she could focus on healing. Painting became an integral part of that process.

At first, it offered an escape on my worst days, but over the last few months, it has developed into much more, she writes in a new essay. Painting sunsets at the beach is simultaneously calming and energizing, allowing her to recharge her batteries and help others who are just starting their journeys with long COVID.

Painting gives me a place to release the medical trauma that people share with me and keep going, she writes.

You may not be dealing with long COVID, but you can follow Kambhampatis lead and shift your mind-set for the better.

Visit link:

Coronavirus Today: Who's dying of COVID-19 now? - Los Angeles Times

Whether a new coronavirus variant takes hold in the coming weeks could determine if Michigan will undergo another seasonal COVID surge or enjoy its first quiet winter in three years.

Modeling from The COVID-19 Scenario Modeling Hub offer projections for the next six months, with a handful of different scenarios based on vaccine uptake and the emergence of hypothetical new variants. Health officials have looked to these models throughout the pandemic to help estimate upcoming trends.

The latest models suggest Michigan could see COVID cases and hospitalizations continue to plateau or even decline this fall if there are no new immune-escaping variants of coronavirus that gain traction through the end of the year.

On the other hand, a new variant with the ability to evade existing immunity could open the door to another rise in infections, hospitalizations and deaths this winter, much like omicron caused in 2021.

Its the kind of situation where I would love it if we got a pleasant surprise and we ended up not having a winter spike, but I think we probably should prepare for one, said Marisa Eisenberg, an associate professor of epidemiology at the University of Michigan who assists the state with infectious disease modeling. History has shown that usually we do get one.

The difference between Scenario Hubs most pessimistic scenario (new variant, low booster uptake), and its most optimistic scenario (no new variant, high booster uptake early on), is about 600,000 hospitalizations and 70,000 deaths nationwide.

The group estimates early booster availability and uptake would avert 6-12% of cases, 10-16% of hospitalizations, and 12-15% of deaths.

Related: COVID questions: Are the new vaccine boosters still free? Whos eligible?

Omicron subvariants BA.4 and BA.5 continue to make up more than 95% of sequenced samples in the U.S. Another omicron subvariant known as BA.2.75, originally identified in India, made up 1.3% of sequenced U.S. cases last week and is being monitored by the World Health Organization.

Predicting what the actual new variant is going to be and when it might emerge is a really tough problem, Eisenberg said. It depends so much on transmission happening not just in Michigan but all around the world, and other variables.

There are a lot of different variants that (the World Health Organization) and others are keeping track of. Whether any one of those is likely to kind of emerge and become the next dominant variant is tough to say.

Michigans COVID-19 trends have been consistent from week to week throughout the summer, with steady increases over the last three months. During the last week, the state reported an average of 1,849 cases and 17 deaths per day -- up from 1,588 cases and eight deaths per day three months ago.

Similarly, hospitals were treating 1,174 COVID patients as of Tuesday, Sept. 20, compared to 777 such patients on June 21.

The latest numbers arent far off from mid-September 2021, when the state was reporting about 2,772 cases and 21 deaths per day. Case counts were likely more accurate then, due to less availability of at-home testing.

In the months that followed, a more infectious variant known as omicron took over delta as the dominant strain in the U.S., resulting in spikes in case, death and hospitalization rates. By mid-January, there were more than 17,500 cases being reported per day in Michigan, and hospitalizations neared 5,000 COVID patients as health systems begged for residents to exercise caution.

The models from Scenario Hub show potential for another spike near the end of the year. They also leave the door open for rates to continue plateauing even despite a hypothetical new variant, as its difficult to predict the infectiousness of a hypothetical new variant.

Another big factor at play will be how much of the population will get the new bivalent vaccines. The updated booster shots, which became available to Michiganders earlier this month, were made to offer protection against the original coronavirus strain from the start of the pandemic, as well as omicron BA.4 and BA.5.

Absent of a new variant, the models project early boosters could prevent 2.4 million cases, 137,000 hospitalizations, and 9,700 deaths from COVID.

The bivalent booster will help fight the omicron subvariants, including BA.4 and 5, said Dr. Natasha Bagdasarian, Michigans chief medical executive, in a prepared statement. COVID-19 vaccines remain our best defense against the virus, and we recommend all Michiganders stay up to date.

About 63% of Michiganders got an initial dose of the original vaccines. Of them, about 59% got an initial booster dose. The state hadnt published any data on bivalent booster uptake as of Wednesday, Sept. 21.

Scenario Hub notes that even the best models of emerging infections struggle to give accurate forecasts greater than a few weeks out due to unpredictable variables like changing policy environment, behavior change, development of new control measures, and random events.

Eisenberg said its getting harder to make these models, because the picture of existing immunity and re-infection is getting increasingly complicated with the evolving coronavirus variants. Still, they remain useful.

Theyre not trying to project whats going to happen, she said. Theyre saying if we get a new variant, heres what it might look like. If we dont, heres what it might look like.

To find a vaccine near you, visit the online vaccine finder tool and enter your ZIP code. If youre looking for a bivalent booster, select one or both of the bivalent shots from Pfizer and Moderna.

Read more on MLive:

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Wheres the center of Michigans population? See how its changed since 1880

Originally posted here:

Will Michigan see a quiet winter or another COVID-19 surge? - MLive.com

Her gloved fingers working quickly yet carefully, Garima Dwivedi filled row after row of little wells on a plastic laboratory plate, pushing a button to squirt drops of clear fluid she had extracted from the blood of mice.

The mice had been vaccinated against a coronavirus infection. Like so many other scientists throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, Dwivedi wanted to see if the animals had responded by making antibodies.

But not just for this coronavirus. This new vaccine, in the University of Pennsylvania lab of Drew Weissman, is designed to protect the world against multiple coronaviruses including those we dont know about yet.

Weissmans research on messenger RNA helped pave the way for the original COVID vaccines, as well as the new boosters tailored to the omicron variant. Yet even before the FDA cleared the initial shots from Pfizer and Moderna, in late 2020, the Penn scientist was worrying about the next pandemic.

In less than 20 years, at least three dangerous coronaviruses have jumped from animals to humans. Before the COVID virus emerged in late 2019, there were SARS and MERS, each of which sickened thousands of people worldwide. A fourth new coronavirus, little known outside China, has so far been found only in pigs. But its a grim one, having killed thousands of animals since 2016.

More than a dozen teams of scientists worldwide are now racing to stay ahead of the next one by developing whats known as pan-coronavirus vaccines. Weissman, 63, is involved with four of them.

Some are designed to guard against all future variants of the COVID virus, as well as the older SARS and MERS. Others might also protect against less closely related coronaviruses that so far have been found only in bats. Some might even work against ones that cause the common cold.

For years, other scientists have tried to make a similarly broad, one-and-done vaccine against the flu, with limited success. But early evidence from Weissmans lab and others suggests that with coronaviruses, the challenge may be more surmountable. He says we cant afford not to try.

Coronaviruses have caused three epidemics in the past 20 years, he said. We have to assume there will be more.

The first COVID vaccines taught the immune system to recognize, and make antibodies against, the coronavirus spikes the dozens of little proteins that stick out from the surface of each virus particle.

That made sense. The virus uses these spikes like a lock pick, breaking through the membranes of cells in humans and other animals. But in someone whos been vaccinated, antibodies latch onto this lock pick so that it no longer fits a certain receptor on the cells exterior the equivalent of a keyhole.

In the early rush to develop a vaccine, scientists reasoned that was enough. No need to teach the immune system about the rest of the virus if the spike cant get through the front door.

Then came the delta variant, followed by omicron. The spike picked up a series of shape-shifting mutations that somehow allowed it pull off a double stunt: avoiding recognition by the antibodies, yet still fitting the lock well enough to open the door.

Thats where the next-generation vaccines come in.

In Weissmans lab at Penn, Dwivedi was testing mice for their response to one of them: a virus-like particle that contains both the spike and other structural proteins.

The idea is that while the spike can change its shape and retain the ability to penetrate a cell, the other proteins appear to be similar across multiple COVID variants and even across multiple types of coronaviruses. Teach the immune system to recognize these shared proteins, or so the theory goes, and it will be prepared to ward off a variety of threats.

But first, it has to work in mice.

Its important to see the response in the animals before you even think about injecting the vaccine in humans, Dwivedi said.

Nearby, colleague Benjamin Davis was analyzing the virus-like particles to make sure they contained the correct proteins. Magnified many thousands of times on an electron microscope, each particle looked like a childs drawing of the sun a blank circle with little rays all around the edge.

Basically, its a coronavirus with nothing inside festooned with enough different proteins to give the immune system a chance to develop an array of defenses, yet lacking the internal machinery it would need to cause a real infection.

Its like an empty shell, Davis said.

But how real is the threat?

Using a combination of demographic and antibody data, one recent study suggests that coronaviruses are jumping from bats to humans far more often than is commonly appreciated likely thousands of times a year.

In most cases, these spillovers appear to fizzle out, says Ken Field, a Bucknell University biologist who studies the immune system of bats. The virus may have picked up the ability to jump from animal to human, but not the ability to make copies of itself inside the person nor the ability to be transmitted from that person to the next.

Still, if viruses jump from animals to humans thousands of times a year, every so often its going to be a bad one.

Weissman, the Penn scientist, likens it to rolling the dice.

In most cases, they just burn out, he said. But every so often, you get a bad roll.

Not that bats have a lock on transmitting viruses to humans. The flu originally came from birds. Other viruses come from rodents, foxes, or raccoons. The key is to exercise caution when interacting with wild animals of all kinds, Field said.

But with continued clearing of forests, industrial farming, and air and rail service connecting formerly isolated areas, risky exposures may be on the rise.

Were making further and further incursions into what used to be wild areas, he said. The animals leave those areas and come out.

Scientists have tried to make universal vaccines in the past, primarily against the flu. But so far, the goal has been elusive.

Thats partly because the flus genome has eight segments, including those H and N portions that lend their name to such strains as H1N1 or H3N2. If a person is infected by more than one flu virus at once, these segments can be swapped, recombining into new virus varieties against which vaccines are less potent.

Coronaviruses are more stable. Yes, they mutate, as the world was reminded with delta and omicron, but scientists hope to train the immune system to focus on the parts that remain relatively unchanged.

Yet much remains unknown about how well these broad-based vaccines will protect humans. A key concern is that the immune system forms an indelible memory of the first time it encounters a virus or a vaccine based on that virus, said Mohamad-Gabriel Alameh, a biomedical engineer who is overseeing the virus-like particle project in Weissmans lab.

This initial memory is so strong that in future encounters, if a person is vaccinated against a slightly different version of that virus, the immune system may respond with antibodies that are more closely matched to the original exposure.

Are these vaccines broadening the protection? Alameh said. If not, we need to change the strategy.

So far, in tests of the virus-like particles, the mice have generated antibodies that match both the original COVID as well as its omicron variant a good sign. Tests with other virus strains lie ahead.

If all goes well, an early-stage trial in humans could happen by early next year, funded in part by the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI), a nonprofit foundation based in Oslo.

Weissman is involved in three other broad-spectrum coronavirus vaccines with different strategies, including collaborations with scientists at Duke University, the University of North Carolina, and Los Alamos National Laboratory.

All are showing early signs of promise. All consist of genetic instructions in the form of messenger RNA, the technology he developed with partner Katalin Karik two decades ago. One involves an artificial spike made with pieces from multiple coronaviruses. Another features an array of virus fragments attached to a molecule called ferritin a version of the protein that carries iron in the blood.

Cautious by nature, Weissman is unwilling to say which one he thinks will offer the broadest protection. Perhaps several of the strategies will prove successful, and they could be used in a combination vaccine.

In science, you like to have as many different options as possible, he said. We just have to test them all, and see which works best.

The only thing hes sure about is that more epidemics lie ahead.

See the original post here:

COVID boosters take aim just at omicron. This Penn lab is going after coronaviruses the world hasnt seen yet. - The Philadelphia Inquirer