Fears that the new type of COVID could escape vaccines

TUCSON, Ariz. (KGUN) – The more infectious Delta variant of COVID was already problematic enough, but vaccines can protect you from it. Now, researchers are concerned that current vaccines won’t work against a new variant called Omicron.

Fast-growing epidemics in Africa have signaled to health officials that they may be facing something new. They found that a new version of the virus, now named Omicron, had mutated, so there were 35 differences in the spikes that the virus uses as a can opener to tear up cells and force those cells to create more COVID.

Current vaccines use the proteins from the spikes to train your immune system to recognize and attack the virus, but if the mutations change the spikes enough, this approach may be less effective or not work at all.

TO Quality of Life Research Center, Dr. Jack McGettigan and his team have helped develop and test COVID vaccines. He compares the adaptation of COVID vaccines to new variants to the challenge of adapting the flu vaccine as the flu virus changes.

“So that’s going to be the concern, I think, going forward and how much has this mutation changed?” And will the current vaccines really be beneficial or maybe a little beneficial? That will take time.

Dr McGettigan says researchers will also monitor whether the new Omicron variant is making people sicker than previous versions and whether it spreads faster.

He says that if a revised vaccine is needed, the good news is that the mRNA technology used for current vaccines allows researchers to prepare new vaccines without five, six or seven years of development.

“Now obviously COVID has brought it to the forefront and I know it is being explored to create new flu vaccines such as RSV, Ebola. I mean, there are a lot of things that are examined, so it becomes part of our everyday life.