The Strange Case of BCG and COVID-19: The Verdict Is Still up in the Air

Vaccines

卷:8

Radha Gopalaswamy¹  Vivekanandhan Aravindhan²  Kalamani Velmurugan³  Selvakumar Subbian⁴  Natarajan Ganesan⁵ 

[1] Department of Bacteriology, ICMR-National Institute for Research in Tuberculosis, Chennai 600031, India;

[2] Department of Genetics, Dr. ALM PG IBMS, University of Madras, Taramani, Chennai 600005, India;

[3] Department of Zoology, Kongunadu Arts and Science College, Coimbatore 641029, India;

[4] Public Health Research Institute at New Jersey Medical School, Rutgers University, Newark, NJ 07103, USA;

[5] Queromatics, Phoenix, AZ 85339, USA;

关键词: SARS-CoV-2;    COVID-19;    BCG;    tuberculosis;    pandemic;    trained immunity;   

DOI  :  10.3390/vaccines8040612

来源: DOAJ

【 摘 要 】

COVID-19, caused by a novel coronavirus, SARS-CoV-2, contributes significantly to the morbidity and mortality in humans worldwide. In the absence of specific vaccines or therapeutics available, COVID-19 cases are managed empirically with the passive immunity approach and repurposing of drugs used for other conditions. Recently, a concept that bacilli Calmette–Guerin (BCG) vaccination could confer protection against COVID-19 has emerged. The foundation for this widespread attention came from several recent articles, including the one by Miller et al. submitted to MedRxiv, a pre-print server. The authors of this article suggest that a correlation exists between countries with a prolonged national BCG vaccination program and the morbidity/mortality due to COVID-19. Further, clinical BCG vaccination trials are currently ongoing in the Netherlands, Australia, the UK, and Germany with the hope of reducing mortality due to COVID-19. Although BCG vaccination helps protect children against tuberculosis, experimental studies have shown that BCG can also elicit a non-specific immune response against viral and non-mycobacterial infections. Here, we summarize the pros and cons of BCG vaccination and critically analyze the evidence provided for the protective effect of BCG against COVID-19 and highlight the confounding factors in these studies.

【 授权许可】

Unknown