3 ms·
Using gene-editing, they created more than 80,000 variations of the hemagglutinin protein with changes in one portion right on the top of the head domain and th
by userbinator 3y ago
Using gene-editing, they created more than 80,000 variations of the hemagglutinin protein with changes in one portion right on the top of the head domain and then tested a vaccine filled with a mixture of these variations on mice and ferrets.
It seems this "new strategy" is basically the brute-force approach.
Maybe a decade or two ago I would've been more optimistic, but it's very much in their economic interests to not have long-lasting immunity.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- tzumby 3y agoBrute force is exactly how our immune system works.
- chaorace 3y agoBrute-forcing the brute-forcer, if you will
- Cheer2171 3y ago> it's very much in their economic interests to not have long-lasting immunity. Whose interests? This is publicly funded (NIH) research from a lab at Duke, which is a university with a massive nonprofit medical center. Government is paying the cost of R&D and it is in the financial interests of the US government to fund development and testing of a long lasting vaccine. Think of the savings to Medicare, Medicaid, and the VA.
- gumby 3y ago> Maybe a decade or two ago I would've been more optimistic, but it's very much in their economic interests to not have long-lasting immunity. You know the government pretty much subsidizes vaccines because the risk/reward profile doesn't really work for companies. Meanwhile there is no meaningful treatment for influenza, so there is no money to be made by not making a vaccine for it.
- gumby 3y agoI don't know why this is downvoted; perhaps it was not clear that I am talking about the US federal government specifically, through the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program, set up by a 1986 law. Without it companies were giving up on making or developing vaccines due to liability.