intranasal vaccine

Image courtesy of AltImmune

All of the COVID-19 vaccines authorized to date are delivered via intramuscular injection. But the intranasal vaccines that are now in development could lead to a more diverse vaccine landscape. 

The company Altimmune (Gaithersburg, Md.) recently launched a Phase 1 clinical trial to test its single-dose adCOVID intranasal vaccine in 180 adult volunteers. Bharat Biotech (Hyderabad, India) is launching its own tests. In Europe, a newly-founded company known as Rokote Laboratories (Joensuu, Finland) is doing the same. 

Intranasal vaccines could offer key advantages over intramuscular vaccines, said Dr. C. Buddy Creech, a professor within the Division of Pediatric Infectious Diseases at the Vanderbilt University School of Medicine. 

First, an intranasal vaccine could trigger a broad immune response that includes both systemic immunity and local immunity in the respirator…