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When people think vaccine they think, ‘only effective if taken beforehand’. Is that the case for mRNA vaccines?
by jjcon 6y ago
When people think vaccine they think, ‘only effective if taken beforehand’. Is that the case for mRNA vaccines?
- nabla9 6y agoVaccine implies acquired immunity. Exactly same mRNA tech can potentially be used to treat cancer, cardiovascular or metabolic diseases, only the messenger RNA changes. It's probably called mRNA drug instead of mRNA vaccine even if the process is the same. mRNA is tech that BioNTech is developing is completely digital. Once you have the RNA structure in the computer, you can just "print out" drug/vaccine using the same process without changing anything else.
- andrekandre 6y agoi seem to recal that with this technology personalized anti-cancer drugs thst teach the immune system can be created with low cost at some point... seems like a real revolution if true...
- epilys 6y agoIf an auto immune disease damages your body but then it stops manifesting, your body will remain damaged. A medical treatment for the caused damage would be called a cure in this case. Vaccines that stop the auto immune response are not cures. A somewhat helpful example is pancreas transplant for type 1 diabetics: the person with the transplant would be "cured" (ie they'd have their own insulin production) but the auto immune disease will destroy the donor pancreas eventually. Hopefully in the future we will have complete, synergistic treatments that take care of both.
- DubiousPusher 6y agoWouldn't this depend on the type and severity of the autoimmune disorder? Someone with mild Rheumatoid Arthritis for example would be effectively cured if the inflammatory antibodies were supressed as their inflamed joints would largely be able to heal near to their original state.
- zilian 6y agoYou are completely right, in many autoimmune disorders if the damage is stopped in time it could be cured.
- Miner49er 6y agoSome autoimmune diseases cause damage that can be healed though.
- DubiousPusher 6y agoI don't think that's ever the case actually. It's just that the immunity conveyed by an active infection often is as good or better than what a vaccine would produce so there's no reason to apply the vaccine after an initial immune response. But just like some vaccines, after an infection you may need a booster later to maintain immunity. Though for this specific vaccine the question is somewhat irrelevant. In this case, they are introducing an antigen that the underlying condition, MS would never cause to occur. This antigen activates regulatory cells which then supress the immune systems production of myelin targeting antibodies. So in the case eof a normal vaccine, regardless of whether it is mRNA or not, the vaccine is conveying information to the immune system that you might also acquire through an active infection. This vaccine however is conveying information to your immune system that no active infection would convey. This all kind of answers my own question which would seem to be yes. As long as they can find an autoantigen that will stimulate regulatory cells which supress the problematic autoantibody producing immune cells. At least that is my read after mucking through the medical jargon.
- dreamcompiler 6y agoSome vaccines are effective after exposure. The rabies vaccine for example is commonly given to people after exposure. As long as it is given soon, it can save your life.
- DubiousPusher 6y agoI could be wrong but I'm not sure the rabbies vaccine is a good example. Because even though it is effective after rabbies enters the body I'm not sure it is effective after the initial immune response which may only occur once the virus reaches the central nervous system. Not saying you're wrong, I just genuinely don't know if an immune response is triggered by the virus before that.
- dreamcompiler 6y agoGoing from memory here so I may be wrong, but rabies takes a while to travel along nerve pathways from the bite site to your brain, and that's why the vaccine has time to work.