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Simin Aysel Florescu, medical director of the “Victor Babeș” Hospital, spoke, during the Digi24 “Frente a ti” interview, about what the new Sars-CoV-2 vaccine contains and what are the benefits compared to the old technologies used in antiviral serums. . He also explained how a vaccine is approved so as not to endanger people’s lives.
“It is a high-yield vaccine, a new type of vaccine that does not include any portion of germs as such. It does not contain virus fractions or killed or attenuated whole viruses, as all vaccines were now. It is a vaccine that contains the” genetic prescription “of the antigen that our body will then produce, as an antigen, and against which our whole body will produce antibodies in the form of this recipe. When the body comes into contact with the real virus, the antibodies are ready,” said the doctor of infectious diseases.
She says it reduces the risk of side effects because it does not contain virus fragments, as is the case with other classic vaccines.
“This risk is greatly reduced. It is an extremely new vaccine and extremely effective from a medical point of view and as a vaccine preparation technology. It is absolutely recommended.
Two of the vaccines that have now reached the general administration level, so they have an opinion, they are prepared in the same style, they have the same platform, “said Florescu.
These serums must be stored and transported under special conditions, according to the medical director of the “Victor Babeș” Hospital.
“Temperatures of minus many degrees for one and minus degrees for the other. In any case, a very rigorous cold chain must be maintained for both, because the only potential weak point is the fact that it is not stable enough at normal temperatures ”, he specified.
“I think there are more substances like this in a spray that is used every day.”
It states that fears about the presence of dangerous or untested substances in these vaccines are unfounded and explains how they are approved.
“I think we are always in contact with all kinds of substances. I think there are more substances like this in a spray that is used every day than in a vaccine.
These vaccines are very well studied substances. There are complete batches, for example, for this Sars-CoV-2 vaccine about 50,000 people were analyzed in official clinical trials, as is done throughout the world.
A vaccine is never administered on the market until the concept of safety, tolerability, and efficacy profile is secure.
I give an example: if during clinical trials, whatever they may be, with a drug, with a vaccine, a patient suffers something, something that is clearly not related to that substance, for example, if he collides with a car. Pedestrian crossing during this clinical trial is considered a serious adverse effect of the trial. They think, “Did the car hit you because you were dizzy from the substance?” Until this is cleared up, the trial stops. Things are taken very seriously. Nothing is ever left to chance and, furthermore, after a vaccine is put on the market for use, it continues to be followed, post-market, with warnings and communications of side effects and others, for a few more years, to prevent anything else. that was not noticed in time. But this happens very rarely, for something else to appear, “added Simin Aysel Florescu.
How Flu Vaccine Can Benefit From New Covid-19 Vaccination Technology
For scientists studying influenza viruses, the latest scientific discoveries in the field are very important, because they herald an acceleration of their research, according to Bloomberg.
“We’ll see how vaccines and all these new technologies work,” said Gregory Glenn, director of research at Novavax, which works on vaccines against Covid and flu.
Influenza viruses that infect humans are constantly changing, so twice a year, around the peak of flu seasons in winters in the northern and southern hemispheres, WHO is working on the best estimate of the strains that could appear the following year. Pharmaceutical companies use this information to develop vaccines and start production as soon as possible, usually by injecting viruses into hundreds of millions of chicken eggs, where they grow for several days before being removed. After a few weeks of additional processing, at the end of the summer, manufacturers ship the flu serums to clinics and pharmacies for distribution to patients in the fall.
In some years the procedure works quite well, at other times the performance is abysmal. Vaccines have been between 10% and 60% effective in the last 15 years, according to US infectious disease expert Anthony Fauci. “Once vaccine production begins, it is almost impossible to start a new one if a different viral strain appears,” Fauci told Congress last year.
Some techniques explored by Covid researchers are fundamentally different. Instead of viral proteins, the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines contain so-called messenger RNA, or mRNA, the genetic instructions that cause the body to produce disease-specific antigens, effectively becoming its own vaccine factory. The technology is still new, and a successful debut against Covid would increase public confidence in mRNA vaccines for influenza and other diseases, according to Meagan Fitzpatrick, an assistant professor at the University of Maryland School of Medicine. “It will be a huge boost. The biggest obstacles will already be overcome,” he said.
The second flu technology ready to take advantage of Covid research is the so-called recombinant vaccine, an idea pursued by Novavax and Sanofi. In this process, scientists remove the virus’ DNA from the DNA, which triggers an immune response. Technicians combine DNA with genetic material that can penetrate the cells of insects, such as moths, which successfully produce proteins and are easy to grow. The cells then produce the antigen that can be collected for use in the vaccine. A Sanofi subsidiary signed a $ 226 million contract in December last year with the US State Department of Health and Human Services to increase recombinant influenza vaccine production capacity at a Pennsylvania facility.
Although not used in Covid research, so-called cell culture vaccines, which avoid the use of eggs, benefit from this interest. In this approach, the virus grows in cells of mammalian origin, which are preferable because the virus no longer seeks to adapt to its avian host.
However, the renewed focus on influenza and the money being spent on Covid prevention will accelerate the transition from eggs to new technologies that are becoming more acceptable, says Leo Poon, head of the health sciences laboratory department. public at Hong University. Kong. “It will certainly help develop more effective vaccines for other diseases,” he says.
Pfizer, BioNTech and Moderna, which currently do not offer flu serums, are already applying mRNA vaccines to others besides Covid. The technology “will change the flu market,” said Mikael Dolsten, Pfizer’s chief scientific officer. “We see a great opportunity.”
Editing: Alexandru Costea
