Intranasal Vaccines

Subject – Science and tech

Context – Intranasal vaccine gets nod for phase 2/3 trials

Concept –

Nasal Covid Vaccine has been developed by Bharat Biotech called BBV154.
Vaccine has successfully completed Phase 1 clinical trial in age groups of 18 to 60 years.
According to the officials, doses of this vaccine administered to healthy volunteers in Phase I clinical trial were well-tolerated.
It was found to be safe, immunogenic and well tolerated during the pre-clinical toxicity studies.
It was able to evoke high level of neutralizing antibodies in studies on animals.
The nasal vaccine is the first of its kind COVID-19 vaccine that is undergoing human clinical trials in India.
It is a novel adenovirus vectored; intranasal vaccine developed to build immunity against COVID-19. The vaccine stimulates a broad immune response which neutralizes IgG, mucosal IgA, as well as T cell responses. It has been developed with the view that, Immune responses at the site of infection (nasal mucosa) is needed to block both infection and transmission of COVID-19.
This vaccine is significant because the nasal route has high potential to vaccination due to organized immune systems of nasal mucosa.
It is Non-invasive and Needle-free.
It does not require trained health care workers for its administration. Thus, it could increase the pace of vaccination.
Intranasal vaccines may be most beneficial for special populations:
children (easy to use, non-invasive)
elderly patients (easy to use, non-invasive)
HIV-infected patients (no fear for needle stick injuries)
multi-morbid patients (fed up with injections)