A capsule containing pieces of dead bacteria sold as a health supplement in Europe will be tested as a potential preventative for COVID-19 in a large government-funded trial
and similar treatments by the European Medicines Agency found "some evidence" they could prevent recurrent infections.Professor Holt said he believes the bacterial extracts give the immune system some harmless targets to train on, allowing it to get better at controlling itself and killing viruses.
"It essentially trains the immune system to respond more efficiently to virtually any bacteria or virus. It revs up the killing machinery, but also the regulatory machinery," said Professor Holt."No one has had any true evidence of the mechanisms," said Professor Sly. Professor Sly’s trial, co-ordinated by the University of Queensland, will enrol 1000 doctors and nurses at three Queensland hospitals to take a daily OM85 pill. On Tuesday, Health Minister Greg Hunt announced $1.25 million in federal government funding for it.
The trial has COVID-19 in the name, but its primary outcome is much more ambitious than just preventing coronavirus infections – of which there are now few in Australia anyway."I suspect the COVID issue has helped us get the funding for this," said Professor Sly. "Certainly the bureaucratic mechanisms, I’ve never seen them move so fast.
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