How Many Boosters Will It Take? A Global Population Beset By Pandemic Fatigue Wants A More Permanent Solution

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Omicron is tearing through the globe, causing spikes in case numbers as well as fatalities that are outpacing even the worst surges of 2020. Masks and at-home tests fly off the shelves and skyrocket in price. Public events are once again being postponed or canceled.

As the world enters another year of the pandemic, COVID-19 is taking more than just a physical toll on people’s health. It’s starting to wear people down psychologically, too. This mental and emotional burnout has been termed “pandemic fatigue,” and it’s leading to a spike in anxiety, frustration, and depression-like symptoms.

What Is Pandemic Fatigue?

The World Health Organization (WHO) has defined pandemic fatigue as “demotivation to follow recommended protective behaviors.” In other words, people around the world are tired, choosing to give up on proper precautions like masking and social distancing. 

Demotivation is a combination of emotions that are commonly seen in individuals who have endured sustained, unresolved trauma or adversity. In an overview of research done on the problem so far, an article in Nature noted elevated incidents of exhaustion, low mood, irritability, lack of energy, and symptoms that are similar to post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and depression. 

The Origins of Pandemic Fatigue

Shortly after the Pfizer Inc. PFE vaccine had been fast tracked by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the Alpha variant emerged in England. As nations hurried to get their populations fully vaccinated, the virus raced to evolve new variants. By the end of 2021, at least 13 variants were being monitored by the WHO.

With each variant, the original vaccines have become less effective, sparking calls for third doses to boost the protection vaccines can provide. Some nations are exploring the option of a fourth booster. There are also efforts to develop new vaccines for the new variants. 

"The problem we face is that we are playing catch up,” asserts Sam Brauer, founder of Nanotech Plus. “We can't keep creating a new vaccine for every new variant. By the time the vaccine is created, there is already a new variant."

The result of all this playing catch-up is a collective feeling of defeat. An unchanging vaccine will not be able to keep up with all variants, and even those who are fully vaccinated are still advised to wear masks and practice social distancing. With hope for a return to normalcy dwindling, symptoms of pandemic fatigue are starting to set in.

Breaking the Cycle of Vaccine and Antibody Resistance

What’s definitively become clear about COVID-19 is that vaccines alone are unlikely to end the pandemic.  Vaccination remains an important first-line defense because it decreases the severity of an infection, as shown by the data that vaccinated individuals are less likely to need hospitalization or to succumb to an infection. 

It’s not well appreciated that vaccines serve two functions with regards to the human immune system.  First, vaccines trigger production of antibodies which can help prevent an initial infection.  Second, vaccines stimulate the production of memory B and T immune cells which provide the longer term protection. The B cells will produce antibodies to clear the virus when it infects. The T cells will kill virus-infected human cells when infection progresses.  However, B and T cells don’t completely prevent a variant of the virus from replicating in your body, they just stop it from doing too much damage, which helps to prevent you from getting very sick.   

“Current evidence shows that the immune system has to be told twice, but not more than twice, to take a threat seriously and produce these long lasting B and T cells which can be done with either an infection or vaccination.  Antibodies though, are much shorter lived so there is a need for booster shots to increase their production,” states Brauer. “There’s a lot of concern about how often people should get booster shots.”  Unfortunately, the efficacy of a booster shot against Omicron doesn’t last very long.

In the long term, people need effective treatments that can fight the disease if they get infected.  There are three types of antiviral drugs under development: antibodies, small molecule drugs that interfere with viral replication (like the cocktails for AIDS or herpes drugs) and a new approach which prevents the virus from ever entering a cell.  Viruses enter a cell in only one location- that never changes.  No matter what mutations a virus goes through, it always has to enter the cell using the same binding site.  So if the virus can’t enter a cell, because it binds to an entry-blocking antiviral drug instead, that will greatly reduce the number of infected cells and give the immune system a chance to clean up the rest. However, antibodies which typically stop the virus from entering cells, become ineffective as variants develop. As a matter of fact, the US FDA has canceled the emergency use authorization of two different antibody cocktails because they are not very effective against Omicron.  

One developmental-stage pharmaceutical company is working on a solution that it believes could break this cycle of viral resistance to drugs that allows variants to take hold. NanoViricides Inc. NNVC is developing a proprietary NanoViricides platform that targets the cellular binding sites that a virus is seeking.  Not only does the drug in development prevent the cell from being infected in the first place, the drug engulfs the virus and stops it from reproducing.  This antiviral platform has the potential to work against any type of virus that uses a particular cellular binding site.  For example, an antiviral drug that worked against SARS CoV-2 should also work against all its variants as well as SARS-CoV-1. 

Antiviral drugs based on this technology could be commercialized within months. The Nanoviricides drug candidate should begin clinical trials shortly. The potential role these antivirals could play in helping the world finally return to normalcy is exciting — and it may inspire a renewed source of hope to help a pandemic-fatigued global population endure a little longer until doctors finally have the tools they need to end the pandemic.

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