New study says oral polio vaccine could be the answer to Covid-19 cure
London, June 13, 2020 (AltAfrica)-There are fresh hopes that Oral Polio Vaccine (OPV) might offer a cure for Covid-19, says reports in a new journal.
Egypt and South Africa continue to drive the upward cases of coronavirus infection in Africa with the two countries recording over 100,000, about half of the entire cases in Africa. That’s according to latest figures
#COVID19: update in Africa (As of 12 June 2020, 6 pm East Africa Time)
— Africa CDC (@AfricaCDC) June 12, 2020
54 African Union Member States reporting 218,229 cases, 5,791 deaths, and 97,891 recoveries.
More information at https://t.co/vEZ4eupedf#COVID19 #FactsNotFear #AfricaResponds pic.twitter.com/BxTbVjt8KI
This news of oral polio vaccine filtered in as the entire coronavirus cases in the 54 African Union Member States hit 218,229, 5,791 deaths, and 97,891 recoveries
READ ALSO: NIGERIA’S COVID-19 SPREAD WORSENS WITH OVER 600 CASES FOR TWO CONSECUTIVE CAYS
Meanwhile, while Covid-19 does not yet have a cure, but a journal published on June 11, this year indicates that some of the vaccines developed to eradicate plaguing diseases of the 20th Century like polio, showed some efficacy against other viral illnesses.
Subsequently, Konstantin Chumakov, from the Food and Drug Administration in the US and his team who authored the journal believe if this is applied on Covid-19, also a viral disease, there can be remarkable progress.
According to the journal, reports indicate that Covid-19 may result in suppressed immunity but stimulation of the immune system by live attenuated vaccines – like the way it is done in polio vaccines – could increase resistance to infection by Covid-19 .“Clinical studies of this hypothesis could begin immediately,” the scientists say.
SEE ALSO: Tanzania says it has begun negotiations over debt relief to shore up economy
The journal notes that trials on BCG, the vaccine against tuberculosis, have already been initiated by immunizing frontline health care workers to determine efficacy.
Risk of dyin
In Denmark, BCG when given to five and six year olds there was a 42 per cent reduction in the risk of dying from natural causes until the age of 45.
In the Covid-19 fight, the scientists argue that OPV is more promising compared to BCG because it is safer and affordable.“We propose the use of OPV to ameliorate or prevent Covid-19. Both poliovirus and coronavirus are positive-strand RNA viruses; therefore, it is likely that they may induce and be affected by common innate immunity mechanisms,” journal reads.
The journal titled “Can existing live vaccines prevent Covid-19” shows that large scale clinical studies of OPV carried out 1960s and 1970s among more than 60,000 individuals showed that it was effective against influenza and reduced morbidity 3.8 times.
This could be promising news since both Covid-19 and influenza cause respiratory illnesses and spread through droplets from infected persons.
