RESEARCH & DEVELOPMENT
A New Strategy to Predict Neurovirulence Risk Associated with Covid-19 Vaccines For seamless adoption
SARS-COV-2 is a continually evolving threat. Containing it requires that we reimagine drug and vaccine development and testing strategies. The COVID-19 vaccine is an achievement, given its speed of development, and given the circumstances, but there is room for improvement still. Questionable legacy tests for safety, such as the Monkey Neurovirulence Test are not fool-proof, as the neural disorder in some recipients of a COVID-19 vaccine attests. It is a good time to leverage the impetus for change that the pandemic has engendered to improving technique. We propose here an artificial-intelligence powered, stem-cell platform-based, benchtop workflow and strategy for reliably predicting the neurovirulence of vaccines, quantifying risks and preventing adverse events. It is fast, accurate, precise, and modular; it can be seamlessly integrated into any existing workflows, is amenable to automation and standardisation, and is cruelty-free. We believe this strategy marks an inflection point in vaccine safety testing scheme for safe immunisation programs. Subhadra Dravida, Founder CEO, Transcell Oncologics Saikat Biswas, Global Head – Life Sciences, iCORE, Wipro Limited Lakshman Varanasi, Academic Consultant Transcell Oncologics Assistant Professor of Biological Sciences, Krea University
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accines derived from live attenuated viruses are required by law to be subject to tests for residual neurovirulence before use. This applies to vaccines which comprise whole neurotropic viruses, vaccines which have a neurotropic component, or those which have been passaged in neural tissue. The vaccine’s viruses may occasion a neurological adverse event, ranging from muscular
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P H A RM A F O C U S A S I A
ISSUE 44 - 2021
weakness to paralysis and death. The Guillain Barre syndrome, caused by Johnson & Johnson’s single-shot vaccineand promptly reported- is the most recent instance of vaccine neurovirulence. The Adverse Events Following Immunisation (AEFI) program in India and the US Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System surveil vaccine use for safety concerns such as these. More than 60 neurotropic
viruses have been introduced into the market since 2001 and the check for neurovirulence is imperative. The test for neurovirulence has conventionally been done by the inoculation of the candidate virus into the brain or spinal cord of monkeys of the Macaca or Cercopithecus genera and observation of the animals for symptoms of neural damage over a 17 to 22
