Healthy young volunteers who have previously had COVID-19 will be deliberately exposed to coronavirus a second time to see how the immune system responds, as part of a new UK study.
Researchers from the University of Oxford started the ‘human challenge’ trial on Monday to investigate what happens when volunteers who have recovered from the coronavirus disease become infected with the virus again for the second time.
The study, which is funded by the Wellcome Trust, is expected to commence in the coming weeks after ethical approval is obtained, and could help accelerate the development of new treatments and vaccines for the disease.
Human challenge studies have played a critical role in the development of treatments for a number of diseases, including malaria, typhoid, cholera and influenza.
Read: Only 50 people are known to have contracted COVID-19 more than once – but new strains have medical experts on the alert
“A challenge study allows us to perform these measurements very precisely because we know exactly when someone is infected,” said Helen McShane, professor of vaccinology in the department of pediatrics at the University of Oxford and lead investigator on the study.
“The information from this work will enable us to design better vaccines and treatments, as well as understand whether people are protected after COVID, and for how long,” McShane said.
Read: COVID-19 infection likely provides immunity for at least 5 months, but people can still transmit the virus, study finds
The first phase of the trial will involve up to 64 volunteers aged 18-30 who have previously been naturally infected with COVID-19. It will try to determine the lowest dose of virus that can hold and multiply in about 50% of the participants, with little to no symptoms.
Volunteers are monitored in a safe, controlled environment while quarantined for a minimum of 17 days in a specially designed hospital suite. Anyone who develops symptoms of the coronavirus will get Regeneron REGN,
treatment with monoclonal antibodies.
Once the standard dose has been established, it will be used to infect several volunteers in the second phase of the trial, starting in the summer. The full duration of the study is 12 months, including a minimum of eight follow-up appointments after volunteers are fired.
Read: Young, healthy adults will be paid £ 4,500 to be deliberately infected with COVID-19 in a new trial
The new study differs from a parallel study led by Imperial College London announced in February and will expose up to 90 carefully selected healthy adult volunteers to coronavirus to help researchers understand how the virus infects humans and how it is transmitted.
According to the latest government figures, nearly 10 million people in the UK have now received their second dose of the COVID-19 vaccine.
Three vaccines are currently in use in the UK: the vaccine jointly developed by the German biotech BioNTech BNTX,
and the American pharmaceutical company Pfizer PFE,
The one produced by the pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca with the University of Oxford; and the shot from biotech Moderna MRNA,
Last week, Moderna said it would deliver fewer-than-expected COVID-19 vaccines to the UK, Canada and other countries, following a manufacturing shortage in the European supply chain.