Texas A&M studying whether tuberculosis vaccine can be used to treat COVID-19
SAN ANTONIO — Researchers at Texas A&M University are currently studying an existing vaccine they believe "could blunt the devastating effects of COVID-19."
The vaccine is called BCG and is already widely used as a neonatal vaccine to prevent severe forms of tuberculosis in children. It is also used to treat bladder cancer.
Texas A&M researchers say they hope their study finds that BCG can help alleviate some of the symptoms associated with COVID-19, resulting in fewer hospitalizations.
"It’s not going to prevent people from getting infected," said Dr. Jeffrey D. Cirillo, a Regent’s Professor of Microbial Pathogenesis and Immunology at the Texas A&M Health Science Center. "This vaccine has the very broad ability to strengthen your immune response. We call it ‘trained immunity.'
"This could make a huge difference in the next two to three years while the development of a specific vaccine is developed for COVID-19."
Since researchers are using an existing vaccine that has already been cleared by the FDA for other treatments, researchers say BCG could be repurposed as a COVID-19 in as little as six months.
The World Health Organization also states on its website that it is currently awaiting the results of two clinical studies on the same vaccine to see it is effective in treating some of the symptoms of the new coronavirus.
Texas A&M is currently recruiting 1,800 frontline health care workers for the study. For more information about the study, click here.
The Texas A&M Health Science Center is leading a group of scientists and medical doctors with Harvard’s School of Public Health, the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, Cedars Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, and the Baylor College of Medicine in Houston.
