The Innovation Leader- Covid-19 Vaccines

Improving Vaccine Efficacy

Current vaccine delivery avenues of the SARS-CoV-2 virus in the human include the

use of mRNA (Pfizer-BioNTech, Moderna), and adenoviruses (Johnson & Johnson). The

mRNA route is infamous for the dangers that the vaccine poses and its varying efficacy rates

(Katella, 2021). A better route of delivering the altered SARS-CoV-2 virus may be the

conveyance of the virus’ protein adjuvant as a nanoparticle. Once in the body its system’s

immune cells are triggered to produce responses against the coronavirus. This method has the

advantage of bypassing health risks noted in other variants of the Covid-19 vaccines currently

in production, such as thrombocytopenia, Guillain-Barré syndrome, etc. (Theobald, 2020)

Another interesting development comes out of Exact Biotechnologies. An interview with the

company’s co-founder and CEO reveals that they are in pursuit of the development of

vaccines that can halt viral replication in the body upon administration of the virus by

utilizing a full antigen profile of said virus (Exact Biotechnologies, 2021).

Critique of Commercialization Efforts

The pursuit of earned recognition and profits for developing necessary vaccines,

notwithstanding, it is imperative that companies be transparent concerning the efficacy of

their vaccines, potential side-effects, and other pertinent information. Safety discoveries that

occur after-the-fact cause a serious blow to public confidence and increase government and

corporate mistrust, in turn causing poor vaccination rates and acceptance in populations

(Tinari, 2021). Companies, therefore, should be held to high ethical standards and encouraged

to provide literature concerning their vaccine products, to allow the government and the

people to make informed choices on which vaccine variants to choose for administration.
 References

Exact Biotechnologies. (2021). Our technology. https://www.exactbiotechnologies.com/

Katella, K. (2021, August 4). Comparing the COVID-19 vaccines: How are they different?

Yale Medicine. https://www.yalemedicine.org/news/covid-19-vaccine-comparison

Theobald, N. (2020). Emerging vaccine delivery systems for COVID-19: Functionalised

silica nanoparticles offer a potentially safe and effective alternative delivery system

for DNA/RNA vaccines and may be useful in the hunt for a COVID-19 vaccine.

Drug Discovery Today, 25(9), 1556.

Tinari, S. (2021). The EMA covid-19 data leak, and what it tells us about mRNA instability.

bmj, 372.