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Medicine

Top Vaccine Makers Already Preparing to Fight Omicron Coronavirus Variant (usatoday.com) 165

While the Omicron mutation might "impact" the effectiveness of our current vaccines, they're "super unlikely" to render them useless, according to Dr. Ashish Jha, dean of Brown University's School of Public Health.

And USA Today reports that vaccine makers are already getting ready to fight the variant: Health experts have said it will likely be weeks before the world has good data about how omicron may reduce the effectiveness of current vaccines, but Moderna has already announced a three-point strategy to combat the new variant...

Moderna's strategy involves three options for boosting COVID-19 vaccination, should omicron prove problematic for current vaccines. The three options, according to a Friday release from the company: A higher dose booster, shots currently being studied that are designed to "anticipate mutations such as those that have emerged in the Omicron variant" and an omicron-specific booster — which is already in the works.

Andy Slavitt, who previously served as President Joe Biden's White House senior adviser for COVID response, said in a tweet that both Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech have estimated a vaccine to combat a new variant could be developed in about 3 months, with some regulatory and logistical hurtles to follow. "If we start in early December, new vaccines could be available by summer in much of the world," Slavitt tweeted.

Multiple media organizations on Friday reported Pfizer-BioNTech is studying the new variant and expects data within weeks. If warranted, a targeted vaccine could be developed within 6 weeks and ship within 100 days, the reports say.

Johnson & Johnson is also testing its current vaccine against omicron, according to CNBC.

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Top Vaccine Makers Already Preparing to Fight Omicron Coronavirus Variant

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  • Possibly relevant (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday November 27, 2021 @01:45PM (#62025811)

    a) The Omicron variant was found in 4 fully vaccinated individuals
    b) Word on the ground is that omicron is mild.

    However, because we are ruled over by some truly evil fuckers, here's my prediction;

    1) Somehow omicron will hit children harder that past variants
    2) One of the symptoms will be myocarditis or pericarditis.

    • Re:Possibly relevant (Score:5, Informative)

      by 93 Escort Wagon ( 326346 ) on Saturday November 27, 2021 @02:12PM (#62025899)

      2) One of the symptoms will be myocarditis or pericarditis.

      That wouldn't be surprising, given it is already a symptom with current variants of COVID-19 [nih.gov].

    • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

      by Gravis Zero ( 934156 )

      However, because we are ruled over by some truly evil fuckers, here's my prediction;

      I don't think antivaxxers are evil, just stupid and obstinant.

      1) Somehow omicron will hit children harder that past variants

      This is a safe assumption because the greater the impact, the better that the virus can spread. This is survival of the fittest, so anything that helps the virus spread better/faster is selected for.

      • by fazig ( 2909523 )
        From personal experience a lot of them are just victims of FUD.
        I did think of most of them as being stupid, until something happened to someone rather close to me. There I know that they're not a bad person themselves, but are just not capable of discerning all the garbage on social media from the reality that's happening around them.
        Having the same lies repeated at yourself over and over again does create doubt and fear simply as part of peer pressure because most of us are by natural social animals.
        I ge
        • But they won't take the vaccine that is so 'new' and 'untested'.

          A LOT of people in Florida think that too (about a free ~100 microgram vaccine injection), but when they get sick they flock to get a free full IV bag of Regeron in their arm, ignoring that it is also similarly "new" and "untested". Gotta love their "logic".

      • by Mal-2 ( 675116 )

        There are three types of anti-vaxxers.
        1. The delusional. This is most of them. If they're eating horse paste, they're in this group.
        2. The grifters. They're the ones making money peddling false cures to the delusional, or being paid off by other means.
        3. Those deathly afraid of group 1 and/or 2, so they keep parroting the lines.

        We've got a hope of peeling off a chunk of group 3, if the fear of death starts to exceed the fear of social backlash. And maybe that will give some in group 1 the direct experience

    • by Xenna ( 37238 )

      "a) The Omicron variant was found in 4 fully vaccinated individuals"

      Nothing remarkable about that. Breakthrough infections are common with alpha and delta as well.

      "b) Word on the ground is that omicron is mild."

      Too early to tell.

    • Question 9:

      The Omicron variant was found in 4 fully vaccinated individuals. You should:

      (A) Keep looking.
      (B) Do nothing, it will all end well.
      (C) Keep repeating this number out loud until something interesting happens.
      (D) Blame the government.

    • by MrL0G1C ( 867445 )

      If people paid attention to their zinc and vitamin d levels then 1) and 2) wouldn't be happening in any meaningful numbers.

      Refresher: You get vitamin-d mainly when sun hits your skin turning cholesterol in your skins surface into vitamin d, take a shower and you can wash that fatty substance off before it enters your body as vitamin D - that takes about 24 hours. If you cover up and don't get a tan then you're not getting vitamin D.

      Vitamin D supplements are best taken 20 minutes after eating a fatty food, t

  • by kot-begemot-uk ( 6104030 ) on Saturday November 27, 2021 @01:51PM (#62025829) Homepage
    Both Astra Zenecca and Sputnik have posted a "no concern" statement already. The abridged version is: All mutations present in this variant were already seen elsewhere and none of them showed significant difference as far as THEIR vaccines are concerned.

    So it is not "Top Vaccine Makers". Let's call the spade a spade - it is Pfizer who is scrambling. Again. Others who are in the world top 5 in terms of administered doses - not so much.

    • by Xenna ( 37238 )

      Vaccines work by presenting an antigen to the body, which then generates all kinds of different antibodies that match different regions of the antigen. Just a few types of antibodies rendered useless by mutations wouldn't need to be problematic. Many types of antibodies rendered useless probably would.

      So you see that every single mutation not being a problem is no consolation at all.

      All vaccine manufacturers you mention use the same synthesized spike protein so they would be expected to have the same proble

      • by Retired ICS ( 6159680 ) on Saturday November 27, 2021 @04:42PM (#62026303)

        The vaccine manufacturers use the spike protein because the spike protein has a receptor binding domain that is common all over the host body -- the ACE receptors. When presented with the "sars" virus, the immune system (as it always does) generates gazillions of antibodies in "random assortments". These antibodies are then filtered through the hosts "self detection" filters which are *supposed* to remove (prune) the "random assortments" which would attack the healthy host.

        However, some persons (presently about 0.3% of the population, so it appears) have "defective" safety systems in that when they are confronted with the "sars" virus they fail to prune properly (ie, some attackers of self get through). This causes additional problems for the host that has a defective response and results in a cytokine storm and a **syndrome** known as ARDS. The defective host continues its defective response which, oftentimes, results in the host killing itself.

        The design goal of the vaccine(s) was to prevent those defective responses by pre-exposing the immune system to the antigen in a controlled manner that would not result in triggering a cytokine storm **even when the host mounted a defective response**. This means that when an antigen gets presented that would generate the same immune response against ACE2, the defective will have already appropriately "pruned" the response so as to avoid a cytokine storm and the death of the defective host.

        The "spike protein" is the wrong target if the goal was to provide sterilizing immunity -- it is however the correct target if ones aim is to prevent the defective hosts from killing itself. It will take a while longer to discover the actual antigen to use to generate "sterilizing immunity".

        • by Xenna ( 37238 )

          "The vaccine manufacturers use the spike protein because the spike protein has a receptor binding domain that is common all over the host body -- the ACE receptors. When presented with the "sars" virus, the immune system (as it always does) generates gazillions of antibodies in "random assortments". These antibodies are then filtered through the hosts "self detection" filters which are *supposed* to remove (prune) the "random assortments" which would attack the healthy host."

          This is how I learned it.

          "Howeve

    • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 ) on Saturday November 27, 2021 @04:39PM (#62026299) Homepage Journal

      AZ and Sputnik were a lot less effective with Delta than Pfizer was. So maybe saying that expect Omicron to be the same is not really saying much.

  • by satsuke ( 263225 ) on Saturday November 27, 2021 @01:57PM (#62025857)

    I won't say I'm not concerned for this variant, but at this point the relevant authorities don't know how transmissible it is, if or how it evades current vaccines, if the illness is worse than other variants.

    So for now I'll continue what I've been doing

    Masking in public
    Keeping current on vaccination
    Following the current situation and adjusting accordingly.

  • super, adv.
    : yet another super-overused superlative qualifier.

  • by bb_matt ( 5705262 ) on Saturday November 27, 2021 @02:45PM (#62026003)

    Globally, we are struggling against an obvious outcome - learning to live with Covid, just like we do with flu.

    Witness the global market impact from this new variant, adding yet more financial misery and yet more freedom curtailed.

    I get it - I totally get it - the biggest problem we are facing, is the collapse of health systems globally, due to the sheer volume of hospitalisations.
    That impacts on ALL other hospital admissions, which ultimately results in higher mortality rates, worse outcomes etc.

    There are many who just haven't connected the dots regarding this or just don't want to - they aren't seeing hospital admissions, they aren't seeing the absolute eye of the storm - that the impact of the virus is not so much that a huge percentage of people will end up in hospital, but just that too many are, too many for hospitals to cope.

    It's also, like any virus, almost a case of russian roulette - are you willing to take that chance? I sure ain't. This virus scares the hell out of me.
    So, at my age - in my fifties - there's roughly a 70% chance I'll get ill and recover, pretty much like a real bad flu.
    But there's a chance I end up in hospital or get long covid, with all the hell that brings.

    However, despite all that, we have no real choice here, we cannot keep on locking down, because the economic damage eventually outpaces the damage the virus causes.

    Within the next 6 to 12 months, there has to be a global decision made - no more lockdowns, but rather, a concerted effort to wake people the fuck up.

    Get vaccinated, wear a fucking mask in public for fucks sake - not much to ask? - just be aware.
    Be aware you are not doing this for you, you selfish motherfucker, but for other people.

    Sorry, got a bit ranty there, but so damn sick of seeing people breezing around in crowds with no care for ANYONE but themselves.

    Humanity really does suck sometimes.

    • Get vaccinated, wear a fucking mask in public for fucks sake - not much to ask?

      Getting vaccinated? Not too much to ask.

      Wearing a mask on a temporary basis to avoid overcrowding hospitals while we learn to live with a new disease? Not too much to ask.

      Being required to wear a mask in public spaces permanently since COVID is never going away? Way too much to ask.

  • Reading the linked article it isn't clear to me whether the six weeks is included in the 100 days. If it is then that makes initial booster shipments in early March, if it is in addition then that's perhaps the end of April, so probably just in time for infections to reduce in the northern hemisphere in the spring.

    Of course, the time factor which isn't mentioned is how long it then takes to vaccinate all of the vulnerable and on the basis of previous experience that seems to be a few months. So, as I s
  • By then with any luck the unvaccinated Republicans will all be dead and the vaccinated Democrats will be dancing on their graves. Yeah I know it's troll but I had to say it. LOL!

  • There have been reports that Pfizer had created a Delta-specific vaccine. It turned out that Deltaâ(TM)s spike proteins were very, very similar to previous variants so the Delta-optimised vaccine had no measurable advantage. Omicron seems to be different, but creating a new vaccine specific to a variant seems to be no problem.
    • There have been reports that Pfizer had created a Delta-specific vaccine. It turned out that Deltaâ(TM)s spike proteins were very, very similar to previous variants so the Delta-optimised vaccine had no measurable advantage. Omicron seems to be different, but creating a new vaccine specific to a variant seems to be no problem.

      mRNA technology allows us to respond faster to new or changing pathogens than has ever been possible. I'm happy to live in a time where modern medical science offers us that benefit.

    • It's concerning that Pfizer has apparently decided to spend time testing existing vaccines before beginning to develop an Omicron vaccine. The decision tree is obvious: Current vaccines effective? We wasted some research resources. Current vaccines ineffective? We killed thousands of people by delaying.

  • I heard when they run out of Greek letters, they're going to start using the annual hurricane name list.

If all the world's economists were laid end to end, we wouldn't reach a conclusion. -- William Baumol

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