Virology
Are COVID-19 vaccine boosters needed?
By Vincent Racaniello
The US Centers for Disease Control have concluded that a third dose of COVID-19 vaccine will be needed for protection against disease, but the science says otherwise. A review of the immune responses to infection will help explain why vaccine boosters are not needed. The graph below shows the relative ...
Estimate of infectiousness during COVID-19
By Vincent Racaniello
Understanding the transmission of SARS-CoV-2 is complicated by the large numbers of presymptomatic, asymptomatic, and mildly symptomatic (PAMS) patients. The reproductive number, R0, is a measure of population-level dynamics, but it cannot provide information on infectiousness of different groups such as PAMS subjects; when peak infectiousness occurs; and the effect ...
Heterologous Vaccine Regimens Might be Better
By Gertrud U. Rey
by Gertrud U. Rey Have you ever wondered if you can "mix and match" SARS-CoV-2 vaccines? For example, would it be ok to boost a first dose of the vaccine produced by AstraZeneca with a dose of the vaccine produced by Pfizer/BioNTech? The latest science shows that such a vaccine ...
Paul and the Mosquitos
By Vincent Racaniello
From the authors of Paul Has Measles and Paul Stays Home comes Paul and the Mosquitos, an illustrated book for children about mosquito-borne diseases. In his camp, Paul and his friends discuss which is the most dangerous animal of all. They would never have imagined it would be the mosquito. ...
T cells will save us from COVID-19, part 3
By Vincent Racaniello
In the two previous installments (one, two) of what has now become my praise of T cells, I explained that the SARS-CoV-2 protein sequences recognized by T cells do not change, likely explaining why vaccines prevent serious disease and death caused by any variant. Today I will explain that virus-specific ...