How the New COVID Vaccines Compare to Other Viral Vaccines

The leading vaccines against SARS-CoV-2 are based on a new technology that delivers mRNA to cells. This novelty, combined with political and social division, has resulted in a fair amount of nonsense commentary about them. The AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson vaccines are also somewhat novel. I thought I would quickly put these new technologies into perspective by comparing them to other viral vaccine technologies.

The first thing you need to know is that the principal purpose of a genome is to store the sequence information for all kinds of different proteins. Our genome is made of DNA, but it does not directly make the proteins. Rather, a similar intermediate molecule called messenger RNA (mRNA) is produced from DNA, and it is the mRNA that is directly read by the cell's machinery to make proteins. DNA -> mRNA -> protein. (Additional variation on this scheme can be found among viruses, but RNA -> protein always holds.)

Next, the immune system can be conceptually divided into two arms that work together: innate and adaptive. The innate system responds in ways that are not specific to a pathogen (disease-causing microbe). It's what makes you feel lousy and gives you a fever, and it kicks in quick. The adaptive immune system takes longer to respond, but produces antibodies and other cells that specifically target a pathogen. The value of vaccines comes from their ability to engage the adaptive immune system such that it is ready to go when the actual pathogen shows up. When we talk about being immune to something, we're really talking about the adaptive immune response.

In order to gain immunity, the immune system needs to come in contact with components (usually proteins) of the pathogen. There are several ways of doing this. I've listed the basic strategies for viruses along with some well-known examples in human medicine. Almost all of them are also used in veterinary medicine. There are some further variations to these strategies, but I think this captures the major themes.

1. Infect someone with a weakened virus that does not cause disease. The virus commandeers the cells to produce viral proteins (via viral mRNAs). This is the oldest and classic strategy. (Examples: smallpox, measles, mumps, rubella, yellow fever, and oral polio.)

2. Inject a virulent virus that has been inactivated such that it cannot replicate. This is also a relatively old method. (Example: injected polio, hepatitis A)

3. Inject purified viral proteins. (Example: hepatitis B)

4. Inject virus-like particles (VLPs). These are essentially virus particles that do not have any genome, and thus no ability to replicate or produce more viral protein. (Example: HPV)

5. Use a different non-pathogenic virus as a Trojan horse to make proteins of the virus of interest. (Examples: the AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccines are, I believe, the first approved human vaccines of this type. However, this strategy is used in a number of veterinary vaccines.)

6. Inject DNA that codes for viral proteins. DNA -> mRNA -> protein. (Doesn't seem to work well in humans, so it is not used in human vaccines. But there are a few examples in veterinary use.)

7. Inject mRNA that codes for viral proteins. This is the newest technology, first used by Moderna and Pfizer/BioNTech. The challenge of this method has been to deliver RNA to cells, since RNA is easily degraded. The technology advancement has been figuring out how to encapsulate the RNA in lipid nanoparticles such that the RNA is protected until it is delivered inside the cell.

In each of these cases, the adaptive immune system is exposed to viral proteins--proteins that were either produced by the body's cells, or were produced by cell culture prior to injection. mRNA vaccines are the cleanest vaccines in the sense that they don't involve any extraneous viral proteins or genetic material. They really get to the heart of the process: mRNA -> protein, and it's exciting to envision how they might be applied to other diseases.

Each method has pros and cons, and has to be matched to the biology of the virus and the resulting immune response. For example, in some cases antibodies directed against a single protein are sufficient to give you immunity. In other cases it's not that simple, so you wouldn't use a strategy that only delivers a single protein. But in every case, it really boils down to exposing the immune system to the right viral proteins in the right way.

Continue reading...

Four Years Ago: What I Got Right and Wrong About Trump

Four years ago today, on the first day of the new Trump administration, Sean Spicer called a press conference to tell lies about the size of the inauguration crowd. Here is what I then wrote:

What to Expect: A constant stream of this kind of thing, and four years of attacks on media, science, and any other sources and institutions that don't go along with his narrative of greatness, or that attempt to hold him accountable. You can especially expect him to project on others his own liabilities....

Here is my warning and plea: Do not give your mind over to his efforts to delegitimize truth. You can like his policies. You can think he's better than Hillary or Obama. Whatever. But make him earn your trust! Don't take anything his administration says at face value. [I'm grabbing you by the lapels]...don't let him (and his acolytes) control your perception of truth. You will regret it.

I think the only thing I got wrong is that not enough people regret it.

Continue reading...

I Was Told That Trump is Like Captain Moroni, Doesn't Seek Power

This is just a reminder that, days before the election, Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) compared Donald Trump to Captain Moroni, asserting that he doesn't seek for power.

 “To my Mormon friends, my Latter-day Saint friends, think of him as Captain Moroni,” Lee said pointing to Trump. “He seeks not power, but to pull it down. He seeks not the praise of the world or the fake news, but he seeks the well-being and the peace of the American people.”

I expect to remind you again in two years.

Continue reading...

How to Tell that Someone is Full of Crap: A Short Guide

A non-exhaustive list of signs to watch for:

• When they say one thing in public, and another in court
  
• When they say that they are not obligated to tell the truth when they are not under oath
• When they insist on things that are denied by the 'hard news' side of their same network or newspaper
• When they make claims contradicted by their own official report
• When evidence and data take a back seat to feelings and anecdotes
  
• When they, as non-professionals, attack widely-held professional opinion--especially when it includes demonization of the professionals themselves
  
• When they widely proclaim that they are being oppressed and silenced (assuming they live in a free society)
  
• When there are no hard, disappointing truths; only corruption and conspiracy
• When they avoid introspection, never admit to being wrong about anything of substance, or fail to give any principled reasons for changing their mind
• When they say that evidence will be forthcoming--especially when they keep saying it
  
• When their primary concern is "controlling the narrative" or winning the debate
• When they invoke patriotism and religion to help sell their crap
  
• When they have a history of being full of crap
  
• When they are incentivized to be full of crap
• When they deny that crap is, in fact, crap

Continue reading...

A Brief Tribute to Clark Goble

I was saddened to hear of the passing of Clark Goble a week ago. I started this blog in 2005, and through the years I always enjoyed and appreciated Clark's comments, both here and at other blogs. I did not know him personally, and obviously my loss is nothing compared that of his family and friends. Nevertheless, I will miss his presence in the larger online LDS community.

Farewell, Clark.

---

Continue reading...

Information Terrorism as a Tool of the Far Right

This article from Wired is worth a read. It shows how the Kavanaugh hearing fit right in to right-wing conspiracy infrastructure. I don't know what the antidote to radicalization is, but if there is one, surely an understanding of who the players are and how they operate must be part of it. The extended quote below (emphasis added) will give you the basic summary of the article, but you should read the whole thing. Given that Church members in America tend to be politically conservative, I worry that they may be more easily influenced by these things--or at least tolerate the means because they sympathize with the ends. To them I would make two comments:

1. Look the other way, and it will only be a matter of time until you become the target.

2. "Verily, verily, I say unto you, wo be unto him that lieth to deceive because he supposeth that another lieth to deceive, for such are not exempt from the justice of God." (Doctrine and Covenants 10:28)

Go forth and tweet.

Brett Kavanaugh and the Information Terrorists Trying to Reshape America:

As Kavanaugh was holed up in the White House undergoing intensive prep to combat the accusations, Blasey Ford was off the grid, moving from house to house with a newly employed security detail, terrified by death threats, swarmed and disparaged by trolls and digital attackers whose smears and conspiracies then bleed over into the blogs and then into more acceptable conservative media. So prepared is this landscape for new conspiracies of central bogeymen—crisis actors, pedophiles, Soros, secret CIA plots, and more—that naked absurdities are liked and reposted without much thought.

Gamergate became Pizzagate became QAnon became entrenched modern narrative architecture ripe for exploitation. The cadre mobilized a movement of misogyny and white nationalism and intimidation—of angry boys who reveled in the chaos god of Roger Stone—and cultivated the narrative to make it acceptable to a wider lane of conservatives. This is triggering violence and identifiable forms of extremism that we can no longer ignore.

This is Donald Trump's America. But more, it is Roger Stone's America. Whatever it takes to win is fair game, even if they burn down the minds of Americans in the process. This willful radicalization is a campaign of information terror waged on fellow countrymen—the necessary domestic counterpart for hostile nation-state information warfare to be successful. It seems no accident that Stone is apparently in Mueller's sights, possibly for behavior that suggests coordination with Kremlin-linked actors.

The leading lights in Stone's orbit take scalps and champion memes, only to shed their skins and awake in a new persona, turning their flamethrowers from one topic or group to the next. In a non-Trumpian America, they might have remained the fringe provocateurs they are, trolling the fact-based world for exposure and ad revenue, vitamin hucksters and doomsday preppers masquerading as political commentators.

But as the Trump Train prepared to leave the station, the conservative media was already so thoroughly riddled with conspiracists and storytellers that the fringe had ample bridges to the much-maligned MSM. To name a few: Sean Hannity and his commentators (John Solomon, Dan Bongino, Sara Carter); Tucker Carlson and his Daily Caller, where Johnson and Judge contributed; Breitbart, which helped integrate conspiracy and propaganda like Infowars and Gateway Pundit.

And, of course, the president himself has amplified conspiracy and demonized "the media"—even while elevating a new ecosystem of far-right media groups and personalities, like One America News' Posobiec and whatever TruNews is. This has transformed the way conservative Americans consume information, altering how they make judgments on truth and reality.

---

Continue reading...

Far as the Curse was Found, Farther than We Think

My ancestry is thoroughly European and Mormon. The ancestors of three of my grandparents were all settled in Utah prior to 1900. From there, some of the lines quickly trace back to Europe, while others go back to the founding of the country before jumping to Europe. My remaining grandparent was born to Midwestern converts. Working back from them, some lines go back almost to the Mayflower via New England, some lines work through the Midwest and then back to Maryland, and others quickly go back to Europe.

It came as no surprise, then, that the results of my recent DNA test showed that my genetics are almost completely European. England and Ireland alone account for about three-fifths of my genome, with the remainder drawing from other various parts of Europe. Like many Europeans, I have inherited a small amount of Neanderthal sequence. Being so European, I was pleasantly surprised to find that a small amount of my DNA has a different origin: West Africa.

It's not obvious where the link to West Africa might be in my family history. Although my African DNA is a small percentage, it's enough that the connection may be less than 300 years old. Browsing around FamilySearch.org, nothing really jumps out. A few of my ancestors were in slave-holding areas. Was there a Jefferson-Hemmings type of relationship in one of my more poorly documented lines, or could it be hiding in plain sight, disguised with an ordinary name? Or did Africa enter my ancestry somewhere back in Europe? Whatever the case, it looks like our family has an unexpected mystery to solve. The first step will be to determine from which of my parents I inherited the markers in question.

Coincidentally, on June 1 the Church will celebrate the 40th anniversary of the revelation allowing the extension of the priesthood to people of African descent. The ban was formally announced in 1852 by Brigham Young who, drawing on the already popular belief that Africans were descended from Cain, explained that Cain's killing of Able resulted in a curse such that Cain's descendants could not receive the priesthood until all of Able's did. Following Young's death, this rationale gradually faded from memory as others took its place.

Subsequent Church leaders wrestled with the implications of the ban using pre-scientific notions of heredity, believing that traits were transmitted through blood.

In 1902, as president of the church, Joseph F. Smith presided over a council that again addressed the issue of race and this time considered what percentage of African ancestry qualified a person as cursed. Smith cited the precedent established in the cases of Elijah Abel and Jane Manning James as justifications for a racial ban. Their repeated appeals for temple blessings ended “of course in vain,” Smith told the council. Apostle John Henry Smith countered that “persons in whose veins the white blood predominated should not be barred from the temple,” an argument for a more liberal standard than was then being applied. Joseph F. Smith replied with an idea that he attributed to Brigham Young. The belief was that racial blood was not passed proportionately to each child but that one child might inherit all of his or her racial blood from a black ancestor, no matter how remote, while the rest of the children might all be white. In Smith’s “opinion” then, “in all cases where the blood of Cain showed itself, however slight, the line should be drawn there; but where children of tainted parents were found to be pure Ephraimites, they might be admitted to the temple.” He then clarified, “This was only an opinion” and suggested that “the subject would no doubt be considered later.” As finally articulated sometime before early 1907, leaders put a firm “one drop” rule in place: “The descendants of Ham may receive baptism and confirmation but no one known to have in his veins negro blood, (it matters not how remote a degree) can either have the Priesthood in any degree or the blessings of the Temple of God; no matter how otherwise worthy he may be.” [1]

You can argue about whether the ban itself originated or was perpetuated by God's will until the cows come home. It is impossible to evaluate the inner spiritual experiences of Church leaders, much less dead ones. However, in my study of the issue it has become clear to me that the various rationales advanced by Church leaders over the years in defense of the policy are a mishmash of ill-conceived justifications built on foundations of sand. They don't bear any critical scrutiny, are at odds with science, history, and in some cases even the scriptures, and they require constant special pleading via appeals to the mysteries of God and prophetic authority. Thank heavens the Church has officially thrown them in the garbage bin.

Over time, Church leaders and members advanced many theories to explain the priesthood and temple restrictions. None of these explanations is accepted today as the official doctrine of the Church....Today, the Church disavows the theories advanced in the past that black skin is a sign of divine disfavor or curse, or that it reflects unrighteous actions in a premortal life; that mixed-race marriages are a sin; or that blacks or people of any other race or ethnicity are inferior in any way to anyone else. Church leaders today unequivocally condemn all racism, past and present, in any form.

It appears that some of my ancestors were unknowingly covered by the priesthood ban. It would be fascinating to know whether any of the Church leaders who upheld the ban unknowingly fell under it. I'll bet there were a few. The "curse" undoubtedly reached farther than we knew.


Notes:
1. Reeve, W. Paul. Religion of a Different Color: Race and the Mormon Struggle for Whiteness (Kindle Locations 4866-4878). You can still see echoes of Smith's reasoning in current guidance on patriarchal blessings. "Because each of us has many bloodlines running in us, two members of the same family may be declared as being of different tribes in Israel."


Essential Reading:
- Race and the Priesthood, lds.org
- Reeve, W. Paul. Religion of a Different Color: Race and the Mormon Struggle for Whiteness. (Reeve wrote the first draft of the Race and the Priesthood article above.)
- Neither White Nor Black
- Edward L. Kimball, “Spencer W. Kimball and the Revelation on Priesthood,” BYU Studies 47, no. 2 (Spring 2008), 18–20;

---

Continue reading...

Would You Buy A Product That Tells You It Doesn't Work? Of Course You Would!

Whenever I go to a drug store, I feel a renewed sense of amazement. Consider the following two propositions:

1. You go to a drug store because you either have a health problem, or you want to prevent a health problem. (For our purposes, we're ignoring convenience needs like greeting cards, beauty products, food, etc.)

2. You want to buy a product that will fix or prevent your problem.

Those seem like reasonable assumptions to me. And yet, many of the products say right on the label, "This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease."

But wait, I thought you wanted something that treats, cures, or prevents a disease. Then why would you buy something that tells you it doesn't?

And it's not like it's just you. The sheer number of them testifies that lots of people buy them! Anecdotal experience bears this out, like when it's flu season and your neighbor says it's time to start taking a product that you know says it's not intended to prevent disease. I guess people just want to feel like they are doing something--anything--and are willing to pay for it.

We humans are weird.

By the way, I just want to let you know that I'll be starting up a new retirement investment fund. It's not intended to provide you any retirement income, but it will make you feel like you are preparing for retirement. I look forward to your business.

Notes:

For more, see FDA 101: Dietary Supplements

See also my previous post with a literally true title, There is More Regulation of Your Dog's Medicine than Your Dietary Supplements

---

Continue reading...