L1 Covid Vaccines

Question 1

What are coronaviruses?

Answer 1

Diverse family of enveloped positive-sense single-stranded RNA viruses

Question 2

What is the biology and pathogenesis of SARS-Cov2 similar to?

Answer 2

SARS & MERS

Question 3

What was covid 19 caused by?

Answer 3

SARS-Cov2

Question 4

When can viruses replicate?

Answer 4

Within human cells

Question 5

What does the spike protein allow for?

Answer 5

essential for attachment & entry

Question 6

What receptor does the virus’ spike protein lock on to?

Answer 6

ACE2

Question 7

When is the virus hidden from the immune system?

Answer 7

Within the cell

Question 8

What cells engulf the virus?

Answer 8

APC

Question 9

What is the B cell response?

Answer 9

Development of antibodies

Question 10

What immune cells destroy virus-infected cells?

Answer 10

T cells

Question 11

What response do you get in natural infection?

Answer 11

Secretory IgA response in nasal cavity
IgG1 (circulatory) in lungs

Question 12

What response was the intradermal vaccination good at developing?

Answer 12

IgG response
not good at slgA1 response as nasal never exposed to antigen

Question 13

What is the downside of the intranasal vaccine?

Answer 13

Does not translate to other regions

Question 14

What is a real difficulty for vaccines?

Answer 14

Stopping transmission

Question 15

What are 4 protein vaccine targets?

Answer 15

Spike proteins
membrane
envelope
nucleocapsid

Question 16

Why did they not look at other proteins after the spike protein?

Answer 16

Poor immunogenicity from M+E proteins
N protein vaccination caused serious issues (inappropriate immune response)

Question 17

What are 4 challenges with vaccine development?

Answer 17

Around for a long time as transient infections
Mutate and evolve in real time
How quickly can you implement global vaccination program?
How can you regulate a vaccine in an emergency situation?

Question 18

Why did normal processes change for covid vaccine?

Answer 18

Political pressure on regulatory system

Question 19

What was changed in the vaccine development by FDA?

Answer 19

Didn’t have to finish phase I before phase II - allowed for overlap - reduced 15 yr process

Question 20

Why was there a large variety of different types of vaccines?

Answer 20

• each company had their own vaccine platforms

Question 21

What are 2 main aims of vaccine?

Answer 21

Elicit immune response
reduce symptoms

Question 22

What is RBD?

Answer 22

Receptor binding domain

Question 23

What are 6 examples of vaccines?

Answer 23

RBD of spike protein
Recombinant spike-protein-based vaccines
VLPs
Replication incompetent/competent
Nuclei acid based
inactivated virus vector

Question 24

What type of vaccine dominate?

Answer 24

RNA vaccines - easy to manufacture as they are non-protein based

Question 25

What is an example of a non-replicating viral vector?

Answer 25

Adenovirus eg. Astrazeneca

Question 26

What are characteristics of the AstraZeneca vaccine?

Answer 26

single dose 66% protection good results overall

Question 27

What are characteristics of Pfizer vaccine?

Answer 27

2 dose -70 storage 95% effective mostly used in ireland

Question 28

What are characteristics of Novavax?

Answer 28

2 dose recombinant spike-protein-based Matrix-M adjuvant 90% effective

Question 29

How did new variants compare to original stain?

Answer 29

New variants were more transmissible but less pathogenic

Question 30

What is a pan vaccine?

Answer 30

Vaccine effective against all coronavirus variants and previous strains

Question 31

What were ethical considerations?

Answer 31

Supply and demand vaccine equity equitable distribution vaccine hesitancy

Question 32

How many doses were needed?

Answer 32

16bn doses

Question 33

Were vaccines rolled out evenly on a global scale?

Answer 33

no

Question 34

What were the top 4 countries with vaccination rate in Europe?

Answer 34

Malta Denmark Italy Ireland

Question 35

What is a serious implication of vaccine hesitancy?

Answer 35

Health services as non-vaccinated individuals most more likely to take up ICU spaces

Question 36

What variant showed waning immunity?

Answer 36

Delta variant

Question 37

Why weren't children vaccinated?

Answer 37

didn’t develop serious disease - problem if there is an outbreak with a new variant

Question 38

What are therapeutics?

Answer 38

classical anti-viral drugs targeting RNA dependent RNA polymerase or protease

Question 39

Whats an example of therapeutics?

Answer 39

Mpro inhibitors (Remdesivir) RdRp inhibitors (Paxlovid)