Moderna to hire around 2k employees amid mRNA development push
reuters.com
reuters.com
Will it still be possible to get vaccines developed without mRNA or will that be phased out completely? Also, I didn’t know there were vaccines for skin cancer, so this will likely be replacing whatever the old treatment with traditional vaccines
It seems certain to replace flu vaccines, which are incredibly awkward. They take a very long time to produce, which means they need to start well in advance of flu season. Some years they guess right about what influenza variants will be prominent; others they don't. If the mRNA based flu vaccine works, I doubt they'll go through the immense effort of developing the conventional vaccine.
But childhood vaccines (MMR, DPT, etc) work pretty well, and cause little harm, so they don't seem like good targets for replacement any time soon. The first targets will certainly be things that aren't currently under control, which has the advantage of being both (a) good for world health, and (b) good for their bottom line.
They may some day try to replace the existing conventional vaccines, especially if it spawns a new industry looking for markets to target. But for the next decade at least it'll all be new stuff.
So I expect for some time to still get new vaccines that uses different method. mRNA is more expensive but more flexible, so I expect it to win in the long run. But as the sibling comment says, they will be used first for new illness because if it ain't broke, don't fix it.
Anyway, a replacement of the polio vaccine may be a good candidate.
Many traditional vaccines contain live, weakened bacteria or viruses, (or dead ones which can become active) which can actually kill someone.
mRNA uses a natural mechanicism for protein synthesis to create proteins that the body recognizes as foreign. The immune system then develops a response. So if a virus containing that protein enters the body in the future, you already know to attack it.
People don't understand what a game changer this technology is for human health.
I agree that we need more long term study of mRNA. It’s super promising for sure and probably safe, but I worry about auto immune consequences.
A mRNA vaccine against skin cancer for example seems particularly desirable for me, but also particularly dangerous potentially, given that skin cancer cells are very close to normal body cells. What if the vaccine goes slightly wrong sometimes and your body learns to destroy your skin?
There is very solid evidence for substantial harms, not the least of which is death. The only thing that is unclear is the probability of that outcome, but based on the approximate number of publicized deaths it it seems to be on the order of 1/10,000,000 +/- an order of magnitude.
That would place the risk of driving somewhere on the order of 100 times more dangerous than a dose of the vaccine, not billions.
In addition there are increasingly large bodies of evidence and studies showing serious side effects, including:
* myocarditis 1/100,000 +/-
* long term tinnitus 1/50,000 +/-
* significant menstrual cycle changes 1/2; yes, 50% of women
… there is also solid anecdotal evidence for other long term and substantial harms, although the extent to which those probabilities play out are much less clear.
It may very well be that all things being equal the risks of using the covid vaccine were less than the risks of catching covid unvaccinated, but that doesn’t mean that it’s without serious risk, and we should stop spreading the propaganda that suggests otherwise.