Would New SARS-CoV-2 Variants Change the War against COVID-19?
Elrashdy M. Redwan,
Fatma Elrashdy,
Alaa A. A. Aljabali,
Wagner Baetas-da-Cruz,
Debmalya Barh,
Adam M. Brufsky,
Sk. Sarif Hassan,
Kenneth Lundstrom,
Ángel Serrano-Aroca,
Kazuo Takayama,
Murtaza M. Tambuwala,
Bruce D. Uhal,
Vladimir N. Uversky
Affiliations
Elrashdy M. Redwan
Department of Biological Sciences, Faculty of Sciences, King Abdulaziz University, P.O. Box 80203, Jeddah 21589, Saudi Arabia
Fatma Elrashdy
Department of Endemic Medicine and Hepatogastroenterology, Cairo University, Cairo 12111, Egypt
Alaa A. A. Aljabali
Department of Pharmaceutics and Pharmaceutical Technology, Faculty of Pharmacy, Yarmouk University, Irbid 566, Jordan
Wagner Baetas-da-Cruz
Translational Laboratory in Molecular Physiology, Centre for Experimental Surgery, College of Medicine, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ), Rio de Janeiro 21941-901, RJ, Brazil
Debmalya Barh
Institute of Integrative Omics and Applied Biotechnology (IIOAB), Nonakuri, Purba Medinipur 721172, West Bengal, India
Adam M. Brufsky
UPMC Hillman Cancer Center, Department of Medicine, Division of Hematology/Oncology, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, Pittsburgh, PA 15232, USA
Sk. Sarif Hassan
Department of Mathematics, Pingla Thana Mahavidyalaya, Maligram, Paschim Medinipur 721140, West Bengal, India
Kenneth Lundstrom
PanTherapeutics, Rte de Lavaux 49, CH 1095 Lutry, Switzerland
Ángel Serrano-Aroca
Biomaterials and Bioengineering Lab, Centro de Investigación Traslacional San Alberto Magno, Universidad Católica de Valencia San Vicente Mártir, 46001 Valencia, Spain
Kazuo Takayama
Center for iPS Cell Research and Application (CiRA), Kyoto University, Kyoto 606-8507, Japan
Murtaza M. Tambuwala
School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Science, Ulster University, Coleraine BT52 1SA, UK
Bruce D. Uhal
Department of Physiology, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI 48824, USA
Vladimir N. Uversky
Department of Biological Sciences, Faculty of Sciences, King Abdulaziz University, P.O. Box 80203, Jeddah 21589, Saudi Arabia
The scientific, private, and industrial sectors use a wide variety of technological platforms available to achieve protection against SARS-CoV-2 (severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2), including vaccines. However, the virus evolves continually into new highly virulent variants, which might overcome the protection provided by vaccines and may re-expose the population to infections. Mass vaccinations should be continued in combination with more or less mandatory non-pharmaceutical interventions. Therefore, the key questions to be answered are: (i) How to identify the primary and secondary infections of SARS-CoV-2? (ii) Why are neutralizing antibodies not long-lasting in both cases of natural infections and post-vaccinations? (iii) Which are the factors responsible for this decay in neutralizing antibodies? (iv) What strategy could be adapted to develop long-term herd immunity? (v) Is the Spike protein the only vaccine target or is a vaccine cocktail better?
