'Operation Warp Speed' is a cheesy, cynical, and perhaps not impossible vaccine hunt

The next National Pharmaceutical Congress webinar will happen on Tuesday, June 23 at 11:00 am EDT. Watch this space Monday (06/01) for details.

May 29, 2020 -- We've arrived at one more end of another quarantined week, CurveFlatteners. It's Mitch Shannon here on the corner of Bleeker and McDougal, bringing it all back home.

As witness on several occasion to the creation of therapeutic advances, we're familiar with the R&D and approvals process, and we know that you simply can't bring a vaccine from Eureka-moment to bench to clinic in mere years, or necessarily even in decades. So, the thought of having a regulatory-assessed, indicated and approved Covid-19 vaccine manufactured, distributed, and ready to deploy by this fall is, let's just say, unrealistic. 

Therefore, we all laughed when the Trump Administration announced its "Operation Warp Speed," aimed at having a Covid-19 vaccine ready to roll, coincidentally before this November's presidential election. It seemed obvious that the program, with its sappy name and suspicious timeline, was intended for the cynical purpose of getting the public's hopes raised, to aid the Grifter-in-Chief's reelection.  

Unless it turns out we're all wrong this time. The hunt is on, reports the New York Times, and progress toward a vaccine may be occurring with unprecedented speed. There are more than 100 global research teams known to be working flat-out on projects and programs, with another 20 expected to be announced in the coming weeks. 

A small trial "snapshot" from US biotech outfit Moderna recently produced some deserved scoffing (Eight subjects? Really? Eight? And no published data? Come on, man!). However, there is no discounting the frantic worldwide race underway. PRC-based biotech CanSino published data in the Lancet on a trial of 195 enrolled subjects. Human trials of an AstraZeneca vaccine candidate are already occurring at Oxford University in the U.K. Elsewhere, Boston's Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center is partnered with Janssen to test its candidate on primates. One clinical finding helpful to the worldwide effort: the virus has demonstrated relative stability and does not appear to have mutated. 

There's room for continued hopefulness, but scientists remain sceptical of finding an efficacious remedy at, um, warp speed. Yale University immunobiologist Akiko Iwasaki tells the Times: “When companies promise of delivering a vaccine in a year or less, I am not sure what stage they are talking about. I doubt they are talking about global distributions in billions of doses.” For all that, a Pew Research Center survey of 11,000 U.S. adults finds 73 per cent expect a vaccine to be available in 12 months.


COVID CHRONICLE 05/29/20

• Chickenpox, HIV, measles: sometimes diseases remain endemic, despite efforts to make them go away. And now epidemiologists have begun to ask: What if Covid-19 manages to fall in that category and is destined to circulate forever? University of Chicago biologist Sarah Cobey tells the Washington Post: “This virus is here to stay. The question is, how do we live with it safely?” Scientists tell the newspaper a large part of an emerging problem stems from the widespread desire to "get back to normal." The difficult task that all governments have so far resisted is admitting to the public that isn't going to happen.
• They're not just for sticking your head underwater anymore: Modified full-face snorkel masks are being repurposed by boffins at Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre as personal protective equipment. Cardiologist Dr. Brian Courtney, working with engineer Dr. Brian Li is developing and testing the recreational products as an N95 alternative, according to the institution. Says Sunnybrook's Dr. Jerome Leis: “In the context of the crisis, we are exploring all options.” Canadian Tire, the retail chain, provided 1,100 snorkel masks to the hospital. 
• Elsewhere in the world of PPE, acclaimed Chinese artist Ai Weiwei created original designs for a run of 10,000 masks, which he is selling to collectors via eBay. Among the provocative scenes depicted in his series is a raised middle finger. Turning PPE into collectable art comes at a cost. A single mask sells for about Cdn$70, with all proceeds going to human rights and refugee charities and Médecins Sans Frontières.
• Who could have seen this coming? The relaxation of social distancing regulations in several U.S. states preceded a spike in reported Covid-19 cases, according to data analysed by Yahoo News. South Carolina saw a week-over-week jump in new cases of 42.4 per cent, and Alabama increased its new cases by 28.2 per cent. The associated hash-tag slogans seem to have been revised for many in the U.S. from #stay-home_stay-safe to #go-out_get-sick. And they are, and they will.

STORIES CHRONICLE IS WORKING ON TODAY

Senior Editor John Evans interviews Dr. Gary Remington of Toronto's CAMH about clozapine-associated obsessive-compulsive symptoms and their management for The Chronicle of Neurology + Psychiatry.


RIGHT NOW I'M LISTENING TO...

Phil Ochs streamed through Amazon Music, with a repeated emphasis on his track, "Rehearsals for Retirement." I was having dinner with a cardiologist friend a while back when he mentioned out of the blue that he'd known Ochs as a teenager. The story seemed implausible until the doctor filled in some details, and it became clear that he had been present while Ochs was visiting a cottage in Muskoka where he was getting over a broken romance, absent-mindedly strumming some chords and writing the song that became "Changes." I couldn't think of anything to say after that. He might just as well have told me he'd once shared an Uber with Mozart's cousin and Charlie Parker. Phil's been my guy since C.B. Parsons junior high school, and his stuff still gets to me every time.

LATER I'LL FINISH READING

Dr. Gavin Francis' 2019 collection of essays on medicine and human change, "Shapeshifters" (Profile Books, Cdn$24.) Francis borrows a little too liberally from the Oliver Sacks recipe book, namely: (i) Blast out your erudition; (ii) Showilly cite the classics; (iii) Mix with an unusual case report from your GP clinic; (iv) Repeat. His method sort of works, mostly. It certainly sounds as if he gets to see all sorts through his busy NHS practice: HGH-popping bodybuilders, anorexics, the gender-confused, and a man who prefers to live (and, ahem, love) among feral cats. The last guy is a real character.  

HAVE A SAFE AND RELAXING WEEKEND

The Daily CurveFlattener will be back to welcome the month of June with Edition #44, come Monday morning. You'll be in the capable hands of Mr. John Evans. Till then.