Latest


BCG vaccine can help elderly fight against Covid-19: ICMR study

  •   Fri, Oct 30 2020 06:02:35 PM

New Delhi, Oct 30 (IANS): The Bacille Calmette-Guerin or BCG vaccine, originally made against tuberculosis, may help in the management of Covid-19, especially in the elderly, says a study by the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR).

The BCG vaccination is known to induce innate immune memory, which confers protection against several infections, the study uploaded as preprint at medRxiv, reported.

"We investigated the impact of BCG vaccination on the frequencies of T cell, B cell, monocyte and dendritic cell subsets," the study researchers from ICMR wrote.

"We also investigated total antibody levels in a group of healthy elderly individuals (age 60-80 years) at one month post vaccination as part of our clinical study to examine the effect of BCG on Covid-19," they added.

The results showed that BCG vaccination induces enhanced innate and adaptive immunity in elderly individuals which may prove beneficial against the coronavirus.

"Finally, BCG vaccination resulted in elevated levels of all antibody isotypes," the researchers wrote.

"BCG vaccination was associated with enhanced innate and adaptive memory cell subsets, as well as total antibody levels in elderly individuals," they concluded.

Earlier in October, as part of a large-scale global trial, scientists in Britain launched a study to test if the widely-used BCG vaccine could help protect people against Covid-19.

A study published in the journal 'Cell Reports Medicine', also revealed that the BCG vaccine has a general stimulating effect on the immune system and is, therefore, effective against Covid-19.

 
  

Top Stories

Comment on this article

  • Dev, Mangalore

    Fri, Oct 30 2020

    One more way to market a vaccine(BCG) which creates immune response in body but not successful in preventing the same in majority of people is what experts opine.
    TB is caused by bacterium called Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Now it might prevent or help people especially elderly with low immune system is a speculation rather than a long term study proven in corona cases.
    Many more drugs & vaccines will be marketed as saviors of people but might prove they themselves will raise or make other viruses dormant & living inside humans as host helping them to live might take over the space left behind by the eliminated viruses through vaccines to become aggressive causing more unexpected strains of infections in future.
    Humans have the capability to eliminate any aggressive viruses caused by imbalance in the body by creating antibodies naturally, if that process gets interfered then it might cause more harm than benefiting the recipients.

    DisAgree Agree [2] Reply Report Abuse


Leave a Comment

Title: BCG vaccine can help elderly fight against Covid-19: ICMR study



You have 2000 characters left.

Disclaimer:

Please write your correct name and email address. Kindly do not post any personal, abusive, defamatory, infringing, obscene, indecent, discriminatory or unlawful or similar comments. Daijiworld.com will not be responsible for any defamatory message posted under this article.

Please note that sending false messages to insult, defame, intimidate, mislead or deceive people or to intentionally cause public disorder is punishable under law. It is obligatory on Daijiworld to provide the IP address and other details of senders of such comments, to the authority concerned upon request.

Hence, sending offensive comments using daijiworld will be purely at your own risk, and in no way will Daijiworld.com be held responsible.

You might also like