Viral vector vaccines aren’t old fashioned, I agree, but they are an older technology. We’ve been playing around with them since a least the 1980s (summary). You’re right that the first one to get US approval wasn’t until 2019, but a lot of that was the FDA moves very slowly when it doesn’t have a reason to move quickly (well, and still pretty slowly even when it does). As of the beginning of covid I’d say viral vector vaccines had a ~20y head start?
Right, Wikipedia cites a 1972 paper using viruses to deliver DNA, but no vaccine until 1984. Whereas, mRNA in lipids went from delivery in 1989 to a vaccine in 1993-1994. So twenty years on one metric, but ten years on another metric that probably screens off the first one by virtue of coming later.
But that’s just playing around. Obstacles artificially created by the FDA are real obstacles. To the extent that the vaccine-hesitant mean anything by “old-fashioned,” they mean large scale experience in humans. More people received vector vaccines in the Oxford trials than in all deployment before. If you want to know about Bell’s palsy, that’s the only way to find out. On the other hand, if you want years of follow-up, a 2015 trial of vector vaccines could have been an big advantage over mRNA vaccines, although I don’t know if they actually followed up after years. With no placebo group, it’s not clear what analysis they could make.
Viral vector vaccines aren’t old fashioned, I agree, but they are an older technology. We’ve been playing around with them since a least the 1980s (summary). You’re right that the first one to get US approval wasn’t until 2019, but a lot of that was the FDA moves very slowly when it doesn’t have a reason to move quickly (well, and still pretty slowly even when it does). As of the beginning of covid I’d say viral vector vaccines had a ~20y head start?
Not sure what level of playing around you’re talking about, but there was also research on mRNA therapeutics as early as the late 1980s.
Right, Wikipedia cites a 1972 paper using viruses to deliver DNA, but no vaccine until 1984. Whereas, mRNA in lipids went from delivery in 1989 to a vaccine in 1993-1994. So twenty years on one metric, but ten years on another metric that probably screens off the first one by virtue of coming later.
But that’s just playing around. Obstacles artificially created by the FDA are real obstacles. To the extent that the vaccine-hesitant mean anything by “old-fashioned,” they mean large scale experience in humans. More people received vector vaccines in the Oxford trials than in all deployment before. If you want to know about Bell’s palsy, that’s the only way to find out. On the other hand, if you want years of follow-up, a 2015 trial of vector vaccines could have been an big advantage over mRNA vaccines, although I don’t know if they actually followed up after years. With no placebo group, it’s not clear what analysis they could make.
You may be right; I’m not very knowledgeable here and digging deeper into this isn’t something I’m going to be able to do very well.
For the point I was trying to make in the original article, it seems like your other vaccine examples would have been better.