Origins of COVID-19 vaccines can be traced to University of Iowa research

Back in the early 2000s, in an unassuming lab at the heart of the University of Iowa Health Care campus, researchers Stanley Perlman and Paul McCray embarked on the low-profile work of making a genetically-modified mouse capable of contracting SARS - a severe acute respiratory syndrome caused by a coronavirus spreading at the time.

They succeeded in creating a mouse with the human 'ACE-2” receptor - and in doing so paved the way for the very high-profile historic achievement of our time: Developing in under a year a vaccine for a similar coronavirus that causes COVID-19.

'It turns out ACE-2 was the same receptor for SARS-CoV-2,” McCray said. 'So that mouse was pulled out of mothballs and put to work for COVID-19.”

The Jackson Laboratory - a Maine-based research repository for 'mouse models” - last year contacted Perlman and McCray about making their mouse model accessible to researchers globally in pursuit of a COVID-19 vaccine.

'They had the sperm from these mice frozen down, and they asked what did we think about pulling it out and reviving this mouse model?” McCray said, reporting that they approved. 'And they've distributed the mouse worldwide.”

Thanks partly to that groundbreaking UI research, more 33 million Americans have been vaccinated one year into the pandemic - and more than 98 million and 335.4 million doses have been administered nationally and globally, respectively.

'I think one of the most amazing things, if not the most amazing thing related to COVID-19, is the fact that these vaccines are available and are being given to people less than a year after the discovery of the virus,” McCray said.

'I think people maybe don't appreciate how amazing that is and how it was built upon a lot of understanding of this virus that nobody had ever heard of - but a small group of people had studied for a very long time.”

Still, McCray told The Gazette, plenty of questions remain.

Q: What are some of the big COVID-19 questions researchers like you are investigating?

A: 'We can make a pretty long list,” McCray said, starting with how long the vaccines in circulation will keep people safe. 'It won't surprise us if it turns out that the immunity wanes over time, and you may need to have a booster - like with the annual flu shot,” he said.

Q: Do you expect that - and would it be one dose or two?

A: 'It would likely be a single shot,” McCray said. 'I think making the analogy that it could eventually be an annual booster, or a semiannual booster, like influenza, probably is a reasonable statement.”

Q: How are or how can vaccine in circulation be altered in response to COVID-19 variants?

A: 'That's essentially what is done every year with the annual flu vaccine - they change it up every year based on what they think is circulating,” McCray said. 'So we should feel comfortable that there's technology available to accommodate changes in the virus.”

Q: Are vaccinated individuals still able to contract mild or asymptomatic infections they could transmit to others?

A: 'That's a major public health question that people are actively studying, and we will have answers to that in the coming weeks and months,” McCray said, stressing the importance of those findings as more vaccinated people begin congregating again.

'You should be following all the public health measures to prevent transmission until we understand this better,” he said. 'We'd like to throw our masks away and go crazy, but we can't do that yet.”

Q: Have you found any common genetic factor or blood type among those who get severely ill or die from COVID-19?

A: 'The more common thing is people's underlying comorbidities,” McCray said. 'So, for example, the elderly - with all viral infections - the robustness of people's immune responses declines with advanced age. So that puts the elderly at risk. And it's been shown over and over again that morbid obesity is a risk factor.”

Q: And why the loss of taste and smell? Have you done research into that?

A: McCray and Perlman studied that using mouse models and discovered that infected animals couldn't find buried Oreo cookies.

'We looked in the nose of the mouse after it was infected - at the part of the nose that's called the olfactory epithelium,” McCray said. 'And we think inflammation or damage to these neighboring cells was affecting smell. So we were able to show that the mice lost their sense of smell and then correlate that with injury to this part of the sensory system.”

Q: Do most recovering people get back their smell and taste?

A: 'One of the mysteries of this disease is some of the variability in how people recover,” McCray said, reporting researchers are keenly interested in the 'long-haulers” with lasting symptoms.

'We know that some people have transient loss of taste and smell and then other people have more persistent chronic symptoms.”

Q: What will you be studying related to COVID-19 going forward?

A: He and his team are interested in other organ systems affected by COVID-19; other vaccine candidates; and what role obesity plays in severe illness.

'We're going to be investigating how obese mice respond to the viral infection,” he said.

Q: With all the rapid research and tools available, how soon do you think we can get back to 'normal?”

A: 'I don't have a crystal ball,” he said. 'But I don't think this virus ever is just going to disappear. I think we're learning how to control it. And I'm optimistic that by fall or the winter that we're going to be in a very different place.”

Return to normal?

UI Hospitals and Clinics epidemiologist and infectious disease professor Jorge Salinas told The Gazette an American return to normalcy will depend on its citizens' willingness to vaccinate.

'America and Iowa are experiencing a very interesting dynamic, in which we try to outcompete these variants by mass deployment of vaccines,” Salinas said. 'Fortunately, the main variant of concern that is circulating in our area … is likely susceptible to the current vaccines administered in America.”

Q: Are some variants capable of circumventing vaccinated patients' immunity?

A: Perhaps, he said. But those suspected of being able to do so are variants uncommon in the United States and involving vaccines not used here - like the AstraZeneca vaccine. And even when they do infiltrate the immune-response system, Salinas said, 'I believe there is strong evidence that the protection of the vaccine against severe disease will persist.”

'It can be a positive message,” Salinas said. 'If you are vaccinated, regardless of the variant that may be circulating, you are protected against needing to go into the hospital or die.”

Q: Should folks who had the virus get vaccinated regardless?

A: 'Absolutely,” Salinas said. 'The immunity that you get from a vaccine is stronger and longer lasting than the immunity that you get from natural infection.”

Q: In that case, are you concerned about vaccine misinformation?

A: 'It is a big deal,” he said. 'America, unfortunately, is one of the epicenters of misinformation surrounding vaccination in the world. And I think that those thoughts and those lies are what's in between us and America conquering this pandemic.”

Comments: (319) 339-3158; vanessa.miller@thegazette.com