Volunteers who have signed up with Houston Fights Covid have been rolling up their sleeves for close to a year.
Right now, they're looking for 12 to 17-year-olds to take part in a study from Novavax. It is a recombinant vaccine, which is an older type that has been around for years.
Sarah Hassan is with the Texas Center for Drug Development and Houston Fights Covid. "This particular vaccine has shown less side effects, verus the mRNA ones. The person getting the vaccine feels more at ease. There is a lot of data on these types of vaccines because we have been using them for so long. "
These vaccines use the spike protein from the virus to trigger an immune response. And they can be given to virtually anyone, including people with long term health issues and weakened immune responses. Examples of recombinant vaccines include those for Hepatitis B, Whooping Cough, HPV and Shingles.
Hassan says while the current vaccines are very good, future ones could be better.
She says this vaccine also also shown very good efficacy against new Covid 19 variants. She adds the fight against the virus is far from over. "Although we do have a surplus of vaccine in the state, our job is not just to protect ourselves and our state. The impact that we're having is global. In order to get these vaccines and distribute them around the rest of the world, we need people to join clinical trials. That's how we got the Moderna and Pfizer vaccine out."
The Novavax vaccine went through wide phase 3 testing later than some of the vaccines which have received EUA and are already being administered. This allowed data to be available on the effectiveness against the South African and UK variants, which were not yet prevalent when the earlier vaccines were in late stage testing.
For more information, go to Houstonfightscovid.com
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