Mikoyan found himself in modern Russia, and he became the governor of the Kirov region Igor Vasiliev, a mathematician by education and a former colleague of Putin.
Kirov Region, Kirov Medical University and the Scientific Center for Research named after Chumakova will soon begin the study of a live polio vaccine for the prevention of COVID-19.
“It is expected that through the development of non-specific immunity, the use of the BiVac poly vaccine will reduce the incidence,” Governor Vasiliev said. “In the Kirov region, about 1,500 studies are planned.”
Let me remind you that a week ago I published an article in which I popularized the idea put forward by Dr. Konstantin Chumakov, our former compatriot and now director of science for the vaccine department of the FDA, and Robert Gallo, a famous American virologist and discoverer of HIV.
They’re going to test the live polio vaccine in the United States as what I would call a temporary coronavirus vaccine.
“Could an old vaccine be a salvation from a new coronavirus,” reads their joint article in the USAtoday newspaper.
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I emphasize once again that this is by no means a “real” vaccine – that is, not that a live polio vaccine helps to produce antibodies that help protect against coronavirus. It is another matter – that any live vaccine (i.e., a vaccine consisting of not killed, but only attenuated virus) excites nonspecific immunity in the body – that is, it launches a cascade of reactions aimed at exterminating any uninvited guest.
For example, a cell begins to synthesize an antiviral protein that can cut RNA. Naturally, there is RNA in the cell, and the protein also cuts it, but the idea here is that the cell will live without RNA for some time, and the virus will die.
In other words, when any live virus appears, the cell goes into emergency mode.
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She is like a bank in which the alarm went off. The siren howls, the grids fall with a roar, the safe locks, the cashiers fall under the table – the bank cannot stay in that state forever, because it has a different function, it needs to issue loans and accept deposits. But the bank hopes that the bars and siren (nonspecific immunity) will help to survive until a specialized SOBR (antibodies) arrives and detains the robbers.
Or it’s really simpler – the cell goes to self-quarantine. You can quarantine the entire body. And you can – with the help of a live vaccine – stimulate non-specific immunity and quarantine its cells.
The disadvantage of this method, of course, is that this quarantine will not last very long (how much – a week, two, three – will be clarified during the tests). It is important precisely because the infection is new, there is no vaccine, there is really no treatment either, and under these conditions, temporary stimulation of the immune system with a well-studied and safe drug is better than nothing.
Especially when it comes to doctors – the most unprotected group now, the infection of which, in turn, turns hospitals into breeding grounds for infection.
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(The beauty here is that we give a live vaccine to people who have already been vaccinated against polio – whether it is a living vaccine, dead. They have antibodies, and they can not get sick, except with some monstrous damage to the immune system and an incredible confluence circumstances).
Actually, it was for this purpose – to temporarily strengthen immunity at the peak of the epidemic – a live vaccine against polio in the 1970s. already experienced in the USSR. Then the GAZ workers were vaccinated, and those workers who were vaccinated continued to work, and the control conveyor on which the unvaccinated worked, got up because everyone got the flu.
The idea is by no means mine, but of two leading American virologists, one of whom is the son of the famous Soviet virologist Mikhail Chumakov, who introduced the live polio vaccine in the USSR.
My, perhaps, was only the thought that in the civilized U.S. trials would last a long time (the epidemic would have definitely ended by that time), and the spoon is expensive for dinner, but in uncivilized Russia, if the boss barks, it can turn out faster. Exactly so, on top of all heads, at one time he approved of the ideas of Chumakov under his personal guarantees Anastas Mikoyan.
Yaroslav Ashikhmin, a well-known Moscow cardiologist and adviser to the director general of the foundation of the international medical cluster, responded to the article.
He approved the idea of Chumakov and Gallo (“the idea is completely fresh and not meaningless”), and he scolded mine, rightly noting that the culture of conducting clinical trials has been lost, and the scientific result obtained after the initial barking will be like the result of research “ Arbidol “and” Kagotsela “. That is, the reports will be drop dead, but not suitable for any foreign publication. Here he, alas, is generally right. It would be better if modern Mikoyan barked in order to provide doctors with masks, – notes Ashikhmin, – and here he is right too.
The only thing I dare to categorically disagree with is that the effect of the vaccine can be investigated without its use.
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“It is enough to analyze how the coronavirus infection flows in those who were vaccinated against polio and those who were not vaccinated. Such studies are currently underway with the BCG vaccine (for severe tuberculosis), ”writes Ashihmin.
But we are only talking about short-term stimulation of the immune system. We do not all know about the mechanisms of the development of nonspecific immunity, but we know enough to understand that it does not last long. By its very nature, it is an extreme, extreme regime. Turbo mode. It is known, for example, that a live polio vaccine in undeveloped countries by 30% reduces the risk of death of a child from other diseases, but not after twenty years and not after ten, but in a year of vaccination.
In this sense, it is extremely doubtful that there will be any statistical patterns for polio (from which everyone is vaccinated), for BCG, or for other live vaccines.
For me, the most important thing is that the Kirov governor decided to take the most important step, that his words show that he clearly understands the mechanism of action of the vaccine (unlike his press service, which wrote some heresy in its press release confirming Ashikhmin’s worst fears ), and that Kirov Medical University and the center to them. Chumakova are determined to conduct these tests at the modern scientific level.
In the end, this epidemic, alas, is not the last. The question of a temporary, intermediate vaccine, in fact, a safe and reliable immunomodulator, will still be for humanity.
In general, the Kirov governor Igor Vasiliev well done. Everything else will be closely watched.
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