thevaccinereaction--2020-05-04--Will Coronavirus Mutations Delay COVID-19 Vaccines?

One of the issues vaccine manufacturers have with creating a vaccine against coronaviruses is that , like influenza viruses , they contain single strands of RNA .
This viral type has a tendency to mutate , making it a challenge to create a vaccine that might remain relevant on an ongoing basis.1 According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention ( CDC ) , seven coronaviruses have been identified as capable of causing human disease .
The four most common are 229E , NL63 , OC43 or HKU1 , which generally cause mild and passing respiratory symptoms often @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” 2 Others are MERS-CoV , the coronavirus responsible for Middle East Respiratory Syndrome ( MERS ) , SARS-CoV , which causes severe acute respiratory syndrome ( SARS ) and , now , SARS-CoV-2 , the virus that has caused the current pandemic , coronavirus disease 2019 ( COVID-19 ) .3 SARS-CoV-2 had been considered to be a relatively stable coronavirus with a low rate of mutation , persuading some scientists that an effective vaccine could be found quickly .
Professor Stefano Menzo , a virologist at Ancona University Hospital observed in March @ @ @ @ @ @ @ show that this is a very stable RNA virus , with only five novel variants , ” adding that , ” A virus with a stable genome is good news for vaccine development because it indicates that the effectiveness of vaccines could be more consistent , possibly over many years.
” 4 Nevertheless , several mutations have already been reported .
By mid-April , researchers from the University of Cambridge mapping how the virus has spread from the epicenter in Wuhan , China , stated the virus has mutated into three distinct strains @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , ” thought to be the original strain found in Wuhan ; the second is “ Strain B , ” two mutations from A and responsible for most of the cases in Wuhan and East Asia ; and the third is “ Strain C , ” offshoot of B and the strain responsible for most of the infections in Europe.5 In April , researchers in Australia and Taiwan also published an article analyzing the mutation dynamics of SARS CoV-2 and found a mutant , stating , “ This represents the first report of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ alarm that the ongoing vaccine development may become futile in future epidemic if more mutations were identified.
” 6 7 For this study , which has not yet been peer reviewed , 106 complete or nearly complete genome sequences were obtained from NCBI databanks .
The study material included 54 nucleotide sequences from the U.S. , 35 from China , 3 from Spain , 1 from Australia , 2 each from Brazil and India , and 1 each from Finland , Italy , Nepal , South Korea and Sweden .
In almost all @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , sharing over 99 percent of their identity .
But on one of the samples from India , collected on January 27 , the researchers identified a mutation that they believe would result in a weaker “ receptor binding affinity ” for human Angiotensin-Converting Enzyme 2 ( ACE2 ) .
ACE2 Provides the Gateway to COVID-19 A protein receptor primarily found on the surface of cells in the veins , kidneys and testes , but also—importantly for COVID-19—found in the lungs , kidneys and intestines,8 ACE2 is believed to provide the entryway that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ virus to connect to , enter , and infect the cells of the body.9 Those spiky proteins on the SARS-CoV-2 virus , specifically an area on the spikes known as the receptor-binding domain , or RBD , where the mutation was found , attach to protein receptors on the ACE2 .
These spikes represent a primary research targets for developing vaccines , therapies and diagnostics for COVID-19,10 11 so mutations that affect their ability to infect the cell may have important repercussions for investigations into COVID-19 .
Agreeing that SARS-CoV-2 has a much @ @ @ @ @ @ @ example , the researchers warned : Whilst it is generally safe to say that SARS-CoV-2 tends to mutate at a low rate , all current analyses are merely based on data collected at the early stage of this pandemic .
As the virus continues to spread rapidly around the world , and more genomic data is accumulated , the evolution and mutation dynamics of SARS-CoV-2 still need to be monitored closely… the observation in this study raised the alarm that SARS- CoV-2 mutation with varied epitope profile could arise at any time , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is at great risk of becoming futile.12