New Protein-Based COVID Vaccine That Doesn’t Need Cold Storage Developed

New Delhi: Refrigeration of the COVID-19 vaccine at the right temperature has been a challenge for many countries. Now, scientists have developed a new protein-based vaccine candidate for COVID-19 that they say is much easier to produce and does not need refrigeration, PTI reported.

The currently available COVID vaccines require cold storage and sophisticated manufacturing capacity, which makes it difficult to produce and distribute them widely, especially in less developed countries.

According to the research team at Boston Children’s Hospital, US, the new vaccine design, described in the PNAS journal, could help fill global vaccination gaps and could be applied to vaccines against other diseases.

The new vaccine candidate elicited strong immune responses against SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, and its variants in mice, the researchers said.

The vaccine was successfully freeze-dried and later reconstituted without losing efficacy, they said, adding it remained stable and potent for at least seven days at room temperature. The new experimental COVID-19 vaccine is completely protein-based, making it easy for many facilities to manufacture, according to the researchers, PTI reported.