Coronavirus Tidbits #69 7/27/20

A Nature study has identified 21 existing drugs that stop the replication of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19.

Some work synergistically with Remdesivir.

https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2020-07/sbpm-nsi072320.php

~ ~ ~

4 Coronavirus vaccines leap through safety trials — but which will work is anybody’s guess

All four vaccine-makers said that their vaccines elicited some kind of immune response, broadly similar to the responses seen in people who have recovered from COVID-19. Trial participants experienced side effects commonly seen with other vaccines, such as muscle pain, fevers and headaches, but few developed serious reactions to the vaccines.

Two teams — one at the University of Oxford, UK, in collaboration with pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca, and one made up of researchers at CanSino Biologics in Tianjin, China — that are developing ‘viral vector’ vaccines published^1,2 their results in The Lancet on 20 July.

BioNTech in Mainz, Germany, is developing an RNA-based vaccine with drug company Pfizer. Moderna, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, has developed a competing RNA vaccine made of the entire spike protein, in collaboration with the US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID).

“All of these [vaccines] are inducing some antibodies that neutralize, which is better than no neutralizing,” says Ahmed. That’s a decent sign, he says. Most trial participants produced levels of these potent antibodies similar to those measured in people who have recovered from COVID-19, which can vary widely.

The slew of vaccine trials detected varying degrees of T-cell responses in participants... But comparisons can be thwarted by the fickle nature of the tests researchers use to measure neutralizing-antibody and T-cell responses. The same test can return widely different values when performed in different labs or even on different days.

The US government’s private–public partnership to support COVID-19 vaccines, known as Operation Warp Speed, is supposed to be making such comparisons, notes Hotez. The World Health Organization in Geneva, Switzerland, and the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations in Oslo, which has provided financial support to nine vaccine developers, have also announced plans to support this work.

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-02174-y

~ ~ ~

U.S. strikes $1.95 billion deal with Pfizer, BioNTech for COVID-19 vaccine candidate

The U.S. government will pay $1.95 billion upon the receipt of the first 100 million doses. After that, the U.S. government can acquire up to an additional 500 million doses.

So far, Pfizer and BioNTech have worked to develop the vaccine without U.S. government support.

https://homelandprepnews.com/stories/52782-u-s-strikes-1-95-billion-deal-with-pfizer-biontech-for-covid-19-vaccine-candidate/