Unlike jabs, nasal vaccines target the respiratory tract, the body’s first line of defence against infection
This kind of vaccine needs to hit a sweet spot where enough virus is delivered to kickstart the immune system, but not so much that the virus starts replicating and results in the person becoming infectious . “That’s not a road people are very enthusiastic about going down with a new vaccine,” said Douglas.
There is also no consensus on how effective a nasal vaccine would need to be in order to make it to market. “It is safe to say that a complete or near complete block of transmission would be preferable,” said Dr Samuel Wu, the interim chief medical officer of the US-based company CyanVac, which is preparing to take a Covid nasal vaccine into a phase 2 trial.However, a small percentage reduction in transmission can make a big real-world difference.
The vaccine, which delivers the Covid spike protein to the nose, offered protection against transmission in animal tests, and the team hopes to launch a phase 1 trial next year. But Iwasaki says a coordinated effort will be required to deliver a nasal vaccine to market, and she has called for “Operation Nasal Vaccine at lightning speed”, an initiative similar to Operation Warp Speed for this stage of the pandemic.
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