At least two American companies, in addition to Russian researchers, are working on vaccines against coronavirus against marten. The animals became ill and died in large numbers due to the virus, which was also transmitted to people in the mutant form.
Zoetis, a large veterinary pharmaceutical company in New Jersey with more than $ 6 billion in annual revenue in 2019, and Medgene Labs, a small company with about 35 employees based in South Dakota, are testing mink vaccines. They are seeking to license their products from the United States Department of Agriculture.
Both companies said their vaccine technologies are generally similar to those used by Novovax for a human vaccine, which is in the final stages of testing. This system involves making insect cells produce the peak protein in the coronavirus, which is then attached to a harmless virus that enters the body’s cells and trains the immune system to be ready for the real thing.
Minks are known to have been infected with SARS-CoV-2, the pandemic virus, in half a dozen countries around the world.
All members of the weasel family are susceptible to infection and develop some symptoms and transmit the virus, at least to others of their kind. This is due in part to the proteins on the surface of your cells and the structure of your respiratory systems. Scientists do not know why the mink in particular appears to be very sick, but overcrowded conditions and cages on farms can result in exposure to large amounts of viruses.
The most serious outbreak was in Denmark, which stopped mink breeding until at least 2022 because of mutations in the virus that occurred in infected mink.
Late last fall, Denmark ordered the slaughter of up to 17 million animals. Most dead minks were not allowed to be skinned for the fur trade. In average years, the country sells up to 17 million hides, but last year’s decision killed its breeding stock as well, and there are fears that the industry will not recover.
In the United States, on the other hand, about 275 small mink farms produce about three million hides a year, according to an industry group, Fur Commission USA. Thousands of US minks were infected and died, but states have dealt with the problem, quarantining some farms. The Department of Agriculture was not involved and there were no orders to kill mink populations, as in Denmark.
Still, mink infections in the United States pose a threat to public health. At least two minks that escaped from the farms were positive. And a wild mink tested positive. Scientists fear that if the virus spreads to more wild mink or other animals, it could establish itself in natural populations and form a reservoir from which it could emerge, perhaps in a mutant form, to reinfect humans at another time.
So far, the mutations observed in the Danish mink have not been a problem. But mutations in the virus in infected humans have produced at least two more infectious variants. Allowing a second species, the mink, to serve as another breeding ground for the virus increases the chances of mutation and also flight for other animals. Consequently, a mink vaccine may have value beyond the industry. And while the Department of Agriculture is now not considering any orders for vaccines for dogs and cats, this is a possibility that companies are considering.
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Answers to your vaccine questions
While the exact order of vaccine recipients may vary by state, most are likely to put medical professionals and residents of long-term care institutions first. If you want to understand how this decision is being made, this article will help you.
Life will only return to normal when society as a whole obtains sufficient protection against the coronavirus. Once countries authorize a vaccine, they will only be able to vaccinate a few percent of their citizens, at most, within the first two months. The unvaccinated majority will still remain vulnerable to infection. An increasing number of coronavirus vaccines are showing robust protection against disease. But it is also possible for people to spread the virus without even knowing they are infected, because they have only mild symptoms or none at all. Scientists still do not know whether vaccines also block coronavirus transmission. So for now, even vaccinated people will need to wear masks, avoid crowds indoors and so on. Once enough people are vaccinated, it will be very difficult for the coronavirus to find vulnerable people to infect. Depending on how quickly we, as a society, achieve this goal, life may begin to approach something normal in the fall of 2021.
Yes, but not forever. The two vaccines that will potentially be authorized this month clearly protect people from getting sick with Covid-19. But the clinical tests that provided these results were not designed to determine whether vaccinated people could still spread the coronavirus without developing symptoms. This remains a possibility. We know that people naturally infected with the coronavirus can transmit it as long as they have no cough or other symptoms. Researchers will be studying this issue intensively as vaccines are launched. In the meantime, even vaccinated people will need to consider possible spreaders.
The Pfizer and BioNTech vaccine is given as an injection into the arm, like other typical vaccines. The injection will be no different than the one you took before. Tens of thousands of people have already received the vaccines and none have reported serious health problems. But some of them experienced short-term discomfort, including pain and flu symptoms that usually last for a day. People may need to plan a break from work or school after the second injection. Although these experiences are not pleasant, they are a good sign: they are the result of your own immune system facing the vaccine and developing a potent response that will provide lasting immunity.
No. The Moderna and Pfizer vaccines use a genetic molecule to prepare the immune system. This molecule, known as mRNA, is eventually destroyed by the body. The mRNA is packaged in an oily bubble that can fuse with a cell, allowing the molecule to slide inward. The cell uses mRNA to make proteins from the coronavirus, which can stimulate the immune system. At any given time, each of our cells can contain hundreds of thousands of mRNA molecules, which they produce to make their own proteins. After these proteins are produced, our cells fragment the mRNA with special enzymes. The mRNA molecules that our cells make can survive just a matter of minutes. The mRNA in vaccines is designed to resist the cell’s enzymes a little more, so that cells can produce extra proteins from the virus and stimulate a stronger immune response. But mRNA can only last a few days at most, before being destroyed.
Zoetis produces many vaccines for cattle and dogs and cats. For pets, it manufactures vaccines for canine infectious respiratory diseases, feline leukemia virus and others. The company began work on an animal vaccine in February, at the beginning of the pandemic.
“When we saw the first case of a dog’s infection in Hong Kong, we immediately put our normal procedures into action to develop a vaccine for emerging infectious diseases,” said Mahesh Kumar, senior vice president of global biological products at Zoetis. “We decided to prepare a vaccine for dogs and cats.”
As soon as news of mink infections was released, the company approached the United States Department of Agriculture and was given permission to test the mink vaccine. In the past, the path from licensing testing to other vaccines took several months.
Dr. Kumar pointed out that veterinary vaccines against coronavirus are common, such as those for infectious avian bronchitis. The disease was first identified in the 1930s, and several companies make vaccines.
Medgene, a small company in its early stages, began working on technology for vaccines against coronaviruses for animals in response to a devastating disease that hit pigs in China in 2013, the swine epidemic diarrhea virus. Mark Luecke, the company’s chief executive, said that as soon as news of the pandemic was released last year, and the coronavirus was identified and its genetic sequence described, a team “immediately started working on a vaccine that was suitable for animals ”.
As the company did not know which animals would be susceptible, it started, as human vaccine developers usually do, by testing it on mice. When mink was found to be particularly susceptible, the company contacted people in the mink industry and started testing the virus. Luecke said it would be viable to produce it this spring, pending licensing.
Outside the United States, other researchers are also working on mink vaccines. Researchers in Russia and Finland are looking for animal vaccines that could be used for mink and other animals.