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A promising new vaccine candidate could protect us from multiple coronaviruses — including some that haven’t jumped to humans yet
The “pancoronavirus” vaccine technology has been tested in monkeys so far. It could mean coronavirus shots won’t have to be given seasonally.
By Aria Bendix
Current coronavirus vaccines were designed to protect us from one particular coronavirus: SARS-CoV-2, the virus responsible for this pandemic.
But the coronavirus family is large, and many researchers think a future vaccine could offer far broader protection.
A team at the Duke Human Vaccine Institute has developed a pancoronavirus vaccine that might be able to protect against multiple coronaviruses in the SARS family. That includes SARS-CoV-2, as well as the virus most people know as SARS — SARS-CoV-1 — which was responsible for an outbreak in 2003.
In a new study, the Duke team’s vaccine candidate was found to protect rhesus monkeys from the new coronavirus (including its most concerning variants), as well as SARS and other SARS-related viruses that circulate in bats but haven’t jumped to humans. That’s an indicator, though by no means a guarantee, that the vaccine might also work in people.
