Is the BCG vaccine really protective against COVID-19?

[Leongsam]

news-medical.net

Is the BCG vaccine really protective against COVID-19?
By Dr. Liji Thomas, MDApr 26 2020

7-8 minutes


A new paper published on the preprint server medRxiv in April 2020 challenges the hypothesis that BCG vaccination confers some degree of protection against the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), which causes the pneumonic illness COVID-19.

The COVID-19 pandemic is still actively spreading across communities all over the world, in over 210 countries and territories. The total number of infections has crossed 2.9 million, with almost 206,000 deaths so far. The most significant case fatalities have been in the USA, Spain, Italy, France, and the UK, but the rates are increasing in many parts of the world.

Heterogeneous spread

Even though the pandemic began in China, its spread has been significantly uneven. After affecting a few Asian countries, mainly South Korea and Japan, it skipped continents to plague Europe and North America over the next six weeks. The rates at which infections have grown in various parts of the world are also quite different.
Researchers have been making desperate efforts to understand how the virus spreads and causes illness. A diverse spectrum of disease models has also emerged to attempt to predict the future burden of disease and the healthcare systems that will be necessary to care for the affected. However, the heterogeneous nature of the spread of COVID-19 is still largely unexplained, though several studies have evoked climatic differences to account for the perceived variations in the incidence, spread, and mortality rate of the disease.

Could the BCG vaccine play a role?

One such stream of research concerns the possible preventive role of the BCG (Bacille Calmette Guérin) vaccine. Since this vaccine is administered at widely different rates in different continents, and because its mechanism of action may involve non-specific boosting of immunity, some scientists postulated that it could have imparted greater immunity against the SARS-CoV-2 virus in countries where it is widely used.

The present study aims to examine the impact of BCG vaccination on the incidence and mortality of COVID-19 using the most recent data and after controlling for the number of tests per million population, or the effect of testing on the number of cases per million or deaths per million population. This is a vital omission since these variables depend on testing for detection.

How does testing affect case prevalence rates?

When the frequency of testing is very different between countries with similar infection rates or prevalence, and similar mortality rates, the result will be that they show a widely disparate number of cases and deaths per million. This is not because of a truly low prevalence or incidence or mortality, but because of the low testing rate in one country resulting in a low case detection rate.

It is known that low-income countries like Afghanistan have an abysmal testing rate of 13 per million population, while Iceland has over 100,000 tests per million (April 10, 2020, data). It is also clear that the number of cases and deaths per million is typically higher in those countries that are testing at much higher rates.

Analyzing the BCG effect

The current study seeks to extend research in this area in several ways. For one, the researchers use a new variable called the BCG Index rather than BCG itself. This is the proportion of a population that has received the BCG vaccine.

Secondly, they used additional controls to adjust for potential confounders such as the HDI scores, the period since the country had 1 case per million, the population density, the above-65 segment as a percentage of the population, the percentage of the population in urban areas and the Corruption Perception Index (CPI) that reflects the transparency of the government.

The third difference was in using tests per million and cases per test as dependent variables.

Finally, they verified the findings from the analysis of earlier studies using the most recent data

The researchers created multiple regression models, controlled for confounding demographic and economic factors, and for the period of reported spread. For instance, the time elapsed since a country reported its first 100 confirmed cases.

The BCG variable was in 3 tiers, comprising those who have never had scheduled BCG vaccination, those who have had it in the past but currently don’t have it. Those whose immunization schedules currently include it. The BCG Index is also included in the analysis, namely, the number of years since the BCG was made part of the immunization schedule in a country. The Index was created to improve the reliability of the data on BCG coverage in a population compared to a cross-sectional or snapshot study of the BCG inclusion in the immunization program.

The researchers then analyzed how the vaccine changed the rates of infection and death due to COVID-19 in that country, and particularly in how this effect endures when testing is controlled for, that is, by considering the number of tests per million population. They also looked at the cases per test (total number of cases per million divided by the number of tests per million).

What did the study show?

Like earlier studies, this time around too, the researchers found a link between the presence of routine BCG vaccination and fewer cases as well as deaths per million.
However, when the number of tests per million is accounted for, there is no longer any effect of BCG vaccination in reducing either the number of cases or deaths per million. Thus, factors like testing may have an impact on the routine administration of BCG and the caseload or mortality rate due to COVID-19 in a country.

Why is the study important?

The false security engendered by the impression that BCG coverage protects a population against COVID-19 could lead to poor policy decisions and bad judgment on the part of policymakers and healthcare workers alike. Universal BCG coverage is most likely in low-income countries, and these are the countries where reducing efforts to deal with COVID-19 by scaling up testing and recommending social distancing could be disastrous.

The researchers are currently setting up a dataset that will help measure the impact of the BCG vaccine over time rather than as a single snapshot.

 

[Leongsam]

ipsnews.net

BCG Vaccine Fighting Coronavirus in South Asia
By Darini Rajasingham-Senanayake

13-16 minutes


Development & Aid, Economy & Trade, Featured, Global, Headlines, Health, TerraViva United Nations
Opinion


Darini Rajasingham-Senanayake is an independent researcher affiliated with the International Centre for Ethnic Studies (ICES) in Sri Lanka.

The map from the medical journal Plos Medicine displays BCG vaccination policy by country. Bacillus Calmette-Guérin vaccine is a vaccine primarily used against tuberculosis. Yellow: The country now has a universal BCG vaccination program. Blue: The country used to recommend BCG vaccination for everyone, but now does not. Red: The country never had a universal vaccination program.

COLOMBO, Sri Lanka, Apr 20 2020 (IPS) - Numerous studies in many parts of the world have linked the BCG (Bacillus Calmette-Guerin) vaccination, widely used in the developing world with fewer Coronavirus cases. This is good news for countries that have universal BCG vaccination in tropical Asia and Africa.
Many of these countries cannot afford extended lock downs and curfews since the ensuring economic and supply chain disruption, loss of livelihoods, and poverty could kill more people in the long term.

Originally developed against Tuberculosis (TB), the hundred-year-old BCG vaccine offers broad protection and sharply reduce the incidence of respiratory infections, while also preventing infant deaths from a variety of causes.

According to Prof Luke O’Neill, who has specialised in the study of the vaccine at Trinity College Dublin, a combination of reduced morbidity and mortality could make the 100-year-old BCG vaccination a game-changer in the fight against coronavirus.

While there is no specific cure for Covid-19, the BCG maybe a flak-jacket against the Coronavirus. Experts note that the vaccine seems to “train” the immune system to recognize and respond to a variety of infections, including viruses, bacteria and parasites.

The vaccine is now being tested in several countries including Australia, Germany and Netherlands against the new Coronavirus – to protect frontline health workers.
In many countries of the global south’s tropical regions, Covid 19 cases and deaths are in single digits, double digits or hundreds; certainly not in the thousands, unlike in the US and EU, and other temperate regions where the Coronavirus seems more virulent.

This variation has been attributed to differences in climate, cultural norms, mitigation efforts, and health infrastructure. Research indicating that countries whose populations have high levels of BCG vaccination had significantly fewer Covid-19 deaths is highly significant.

Countries that do not have universal policies of BCG vaccination, such as Italy, the Netherlands, and the United States, have been more severely affected compared to countries with universal and long-standing BCG policies,” noted Gonzalo Otazu, assistant professor of biomedical sciences at NYIT.

BCG flattens the disease curve since countries that use BCG vaccination programs had a fatality rate of four per million people, while countries without BCG vaccination programs were 10 times more likely to die at a rate of 40 deaths per million people.

While he stressed the research was largely a statistical one and so came with caveats, there was a case for authorities moving to provide a BCG vaccine top-up for everybody age over 70. “This is feasible and should be considered.

BCG in South Asia

In South Asia, the vaccine has been universally used for decades. India and Pakistan started using BCG in 1948 and in Sri Lanka, BCG vaccination became mandatory in 1949, according to the Ministry of Health epidemiology unit. Compared to case numbers in Europe and North America, and relative to population size South Asian countries have registered low numbers and Covid 19 case load.

Three weeks after a pandemic was declared by the World Health Organization (WHO), it is increasingly clear from the Covid 19 data that Asian countries which practice universal BCG vaccination are relatively better positioned to fight Coronavirus — despite the crippling curfews that saw millions of migrant labourers walking hundreds of miles and dying in the process to get home.

In addition to BCG, hot and humid tropical weather may be another factor inhibiting the spread and strength of the Covid 19 flu in South Asia. Countries that have a late start of universal BCG policy (Iran, 1984) had high mortality, consistent with the idea that BCG protects the vaccinated elderly population.

Pakistan, a country with 200 million people that did not impose the crippling curfews that neighbouring India and Sri Lanka did, had 4,072 patients with 59 deaths on April 10. Pakistan Prime Minister, Imran Khan, sensibly pointed out that more people would die of poverty caused by lockdowns in the long run.
In Sri Lanka where a brutal curfew was imposed, there have been under 210 Covid 19 cases with 7 deaths, and India a country with more than a billion people has reported 9,000 cases over 3 weeks.

There have been only 12,434 confirmed cases in all 10 Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) member states, a miniscule number compared to China, Italy, Spain and the United States, and about the same as Canada, a country of just 37.6 million compared to Southeast Asia’s 622 million.

While lack of testing may be cited as a reason for the relatively low numbers, by now – three weeks after Covid-19 was declared a global pandemic and months after the epidemic in neighbouring China – the region surely should have expected an explosion of cases similar to Italy and Spain.

Clearly in tropical Asian countries, including those with poor health systems the epidemic is far more limited.

This fact raises questions about the Indian and Sri Lankan government’s imposition of economically devastating and socially crippling curfews at the urging of the WHO and Johns Hopkins University (JHU) which is collecting Covid 19 data for a global database, while providing analysis seeming based on simulated pandemic from the mysterious EVENT 201 which was staged last October with the WHO and Gates Foundation and others modeling a fictional novel coronavirus.

WHO’s data and policy recommendations

The bad news is that the World Health Organization (WHO) which is funded by States and big pharmaceutical companies that are rushing to develop Covid 19 vaccines and make big profits,claims on its website that :

• “there is no evidence that the Bacille Calmette-Guérin vaccine (BCG) protects people against infection with COVID-19 virus. Two clinical trials addressing this question are underway, and WHO will evaluate the evidence when it is available. In the absence of evidence, WHO does not recommend BCG vaccination for the prevention of COVID-19..

The WHO’s pandemic narrative and call for lockdowns to fight Covid 19 that have caused massive livelihood loss and economic meltdowns in countries like India and Sri Lanka (with the GMOA in tow), have not been modulated by the evidence that the BCG vaccine may act as barrier to the disease.

In short, while the BCG may be a ‘game changer’ in the long run, also in assisting development of herd immunity which would mitigate need for harsh curfews imposed in developing countries that cannot afford shutdowns, the WHO denies this. Heaven forbid that a BCG booster may be the solution in front of us!

There are parallels in the WHO’s denial that the anti-Malaria drug Hydroxychloroquine could be beneficial for Covid 19 patients, while pushing for development of new drugs and vaccines that would bring big profits to drug companies, although researchers in France and China had reported success with the drug.

Increasingly, questions are being raised about the WHO’s Covid19 data, models and analysis. Professor Jay Battacharya of Stanford University has noted that “the claim that coronavirus would kill millions without shelter-in-place orders and quarantines is highly questionable”.

In an interview at the Hoover Institute he observed: “there’s little evidence to confirm that premise—and projections of the death toll could plausibly be orders of magnitude too high.” Fear of Covid-19 is based on its high estimated case fatality rate—2% to 4% of people with confirmed Covid-19, according to the World Health Organization and others.

Drs. Eran Bendavid and Jay Bhattacharya argue that Covid-19 isn’t as deadly as suggested and suggest that the “extraordinary measures” being pushed by the WHO may not be justified. Their argument is that the total number of coronavirus infections is much higher than we think, which mathematically means the mortality rate is much lower.

Exaggeration using war metaphors and nationalism has characterized the WHO’s Covid pandemic narrative. However, the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington School of Medicine now predicts that fewer people will die and fewer hospital beds will be needed compared to estimates from last week.
As of last week, the model predicted the virus will kill 60,000 people in the United States over the next four months – 33,000 fewer deaths than estimated last Thursday.
In India, the WHO this week was compelled to correct an exaggeration in a report that claimed that Covid19 had reached level 3 – community spread severity. In Sri Lanka several doctors have challenged Covid 19 case numbers and suggested that there is inflation and data manipulation.

We know very little about the virus, but shut down your economies –WHO

“Better to get Corona than see our harvest rotting without customers’, said a famer at the shuttered vegetable wholesale market in Dambulla, central Sri Lanka recently, indicating that there is no trade off to be made between lives and livelihoods as you cannot have one without the other especially in developing countries with high poverty rates.

Farmer suicide rates in South Asia tend to be high due to poverty and debt.

Would the WHO and its director general who called to congratulate the strongman President of Sri Lanka for imposing an indiscriminate and economically destructive month long curfew with military enforcement also count the deaths of farmers, wage-less day labourers and migrant workers who make up the greater part of the labour force who walked hundreds of miles to get home after the imposition of brutal lock downs in India with just 4 hours advanced notice?

WHO’s Covid 19 global media narrative (Al Jazeera CNN, BBC etc), has concentrated on hyping up fear psychosis and groupthink, based on data from Europe and North America, while suppressing mitigating information in the global south.

This has resulted in economically devastating policy making in India and Sri Lanka and a devil’s bargain – an attempt to trade off lives with livelihoods.

The flood of Covid data and information in the media, masks a lack of adequate data disaggregation, comparative analysis and modelling by geographic region and country, as well as, an ahistorical approach. After all, seasonal flu is known to infect over a billion people and kill as many as 750,000 people annually according to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC).

The crippling curfews and destruction of the real economy in India and Sri Lanka reveals serious short comings in national and South Asian (SAARC) regional data analysis, planning and policy making, by the Modi and Rajapaksa governments, and allied medical associations like the Government Medical Officers’ Association (GMOA), as well as, the failure to access regional expertise.

Claims that curfews and lockdowns cannot end until a vaccine is found, reflect bias toward big pharmaceutical companies that also fund research and the WHO, which stand to profit from a new “gold standard” Covonavirrus vaccine.

Surveillance, fear and groupthink

Although the great majority of people who get Corona virus will have mild symptom and survive well, with the creation of a Coronavirus global fear psychosis, economies have been shut down, livelihoods destroyed, and democratic rights compromised as new systems of surveillance and governance are being put in place – for patient network tracking.

In Sri Lanka a brand new USAID funded hospital exclusively for Covid 19 patients has been constructed with promised funding or USD 1.3 million at the former Voice of America compound in Chilaw, equipped with robots, and surveillance technologies “to activate case finding and event-based surveillance, with technical experts for response and preparedness.

The Covid-19 outbreak reveals how pervasive surveillance mechanisms developed in the last decade or so have become. In a strategically located country like Sri Lanka with an under-developed tech sector, foreign countries may access private data platforms via such surveillance platforms is a concern.

Meanwhile, US President Trump’s withdrawal of funds from WHO citing China bias distracts from a more substantive bias at WHO toward big drug companies and related foundations that stand to make a windfall from a Covid 19 vaccine, as well as, related data and policy manipulated that constitute a danger to the health and well-being, lives and livelihood of people everywhere.

This bias is also shared among medical associations like the Government Medical Officers Association (GMOA), in Sri Lanka.

As Professor Nyasa Mboti of Free Town University, wrote: : “by its own admission, WHO seems to have declared Covid19 a pandemic IN ORDER to avert a Covid19 pandemic. This seems illogical. You cannot be in a pandemic that has not YET started, and you can only avert a crisis that has NOT YET taken place.
The current global coronavirus crisis is proof that global agencies such as the WHO can actually cause irreparable harm. Perhaps their global roles need to be called into serious question. “

 

[sleaguepunter]

Boss Sam shd recommenced MOM giving all FWs BCG vaccinations before entering the island to work. Costs to employers.

 

[cowbellc]

news-medical.net

Is the BCG vaccine really protective against COVID-19?
By Dr. Liji Thomas, MDApr 26 2020

7-8 minutes


A new paper published on the preprint server medRxiv in April 2020 challenges the hypothesis that BCG vaccination confers some degree of protection against the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), which causes the pneumonic illness COVID-19.

The COVID-19 pandemic is still actively spreading across communities all over the world, in over 210 countries and territories. The total number of infections has crossed 2.9 million, with almost 206,000 deaths so far. The most significant case fatalities have been in the USA, Spain, Italy, France, and the UK, but the rates are increasing in many parts of the world.

Heterogeneous spread

Even though the pandemic began in China, its spread has been significantly uneven. After affecting a few Asian countries, mainly South Korea and Japan, it skipped continents to plague Europe and North America over the next six weeks. The rates at which infections have grown in various parts of the world are also quite different.
Researchers have been making desperate efforts to understand how the virus spreads and causes illness. A diverse spectrum of disease models has also emerged to attempt to predict the future burden of disease and the healthcare systems that will be necessary to care for the affected. However, the heterogeneous nature of the spread of COVID-19 is still largely unexplained, though several studies have evoked climatic differences to account for the perceived variations in the incidence, spread, and mortality rate of the disease.

Could the BCG vaccine play a role?

One such stream of research concerns the possible preventive role of the BCG (Bacille Calmette Guérin) vaccine. Since this vaccine is administered at widely different rates in different continents, and because its mechanism of action may involve non-specific boosting of immunity, some scientists postulated that it could have imparted greater immunity against the SARS-CoV-2 virus in countries where it is widely used.

The present study aims to examine the impact of BCG vaccination on the incidence and mortality of COVID-19 using the most recent data and after controlling for the number of tests per million population, or the effect of testing on the number of cases per million or deaths per million population. This is a vital omission since these variables depend on testing for detection.

How does testing affect case prevalence rates?

When the frequency of testing is very different between countries with similar infection rates or prevalence, and similar mortality rates, the result will be that they show a widely disparate number of cases and deaths per million. This is not because of a truly low prevalence or incidence or mortality, but because of the low testing rate in one country resulting in a low case detection rate.

It is known that low-income countries like Afghanistan have an abysmal testing rate of 13 per million population, while Iceland has over 100,000 tests per million (April 10, 2020, data). It is also clear that the number of cases and deaths per million is typically higher in those countries that are testing at much higher rates.

Analyzing the BCG effect

The current study seeks to extend research in this area in several ways. For one, the researchers use a new variable called the BCG Index rather than BCG itself. This is the proportion of a population that has received the BCG vaccine.

Secondly, they used additional controls to adjust for potential confounders such as the HDI scores, the period since the country had 1 case per million, the population density, the above-65 segment as a percentage of the population, the percentage of the population in urban areas and the Corruption Perception Index (CPI) that reflects the transparency of the government.

The third difference was in using tests per million and cases per test as dependent variables.

Finally, they verified the findings from the analysis of earlier studies using the most recent data

The researchers created multiple regression models, controlled for confounding demographic and economic factors, and for the period of reported spread. For instance, the time elapsed since a country reported its first 100 confirmed cases.

The BCG variable was in 3 tiers, comprising those who have never had scheduled BCG vaccination, those who have had it in the past but currently don’t have it. Those whose immunization schedules currently include it. The BCG Index is also included in the analysis, namely, the number of years since the BCG was made part of the immunization schedule in a country. The Index was created to improve the reliability of the data on BCG coverage in a population compared to a cross-sectional or snapshot study of the BCG inclusion in the immunization program.

The researchers then analyzed how the vaccine changed the rates of infection and death due to COVID-19 in that country, and particularly in how this effect endures when testing is controlled for, that is, by considering the number of tests per million population. They also looked at the cases per test (total number of cases per million divided by the number of tests per million).

What did the study show?

Like earlier studies, this time around too, the researchers found a link between the presence of routine BCG vaccination and fewer cases as well as deaths per million.
However, when the number of tests per million is accounted for, there is no longer any effect of BCG vaccination in reducing either the number of cases or deaths per million. Thus, factors like testing may have an impact on the routine administration of BCG and the caseload or mortality rate due to COVID-19 in a country.

Why is the study important?

The false security engendered by the impression that BCG coverage protects a population against COVID-19 could lead to poor policy decisions and bad judgment on the part of policymakers and healthcare workers alike. Universal BCG coverage is most likely in low-income countries, and these are the countries where reducing efforts to deal with COVID-19 by scaling up testing and recommending social distancing could be disastrous.

The researchers are currently setting up a dataset that will help measure the impact of the BCG vaccine over time rather than as a single snapshot.

Thought pri 6 fire needle is for tb one?

 

[knowwhatyouwantinlife]

Highly recommend all to re bcg plus get the flu vaccination...will not make one immune to covid but this combo is cheap safe and will slow the spread of the virus thus preventing it from destroying vital organs...who knows we may need to get both before we can travel again and when we travel we may need to attach a vaccination booklet to our passports just like a Visa

 

[Leongsam]

Boss Sam shd recommenced MOM giving all FWs BCG vaccinations before entering the island to work. Costs to employers.

There is no direct evidence that it works yet. It's just an observation that has been made.

 

[vamjok]

Thought pri 6 fire needle is for tb one?

yes that one. however due to mutation of TB strains, there are strong evidences that the BCG vaccine no longer works against current TB, that is why it is discontinued in the younger generations.

 

[cowbellc]

yes that one. however due to mutation of TB strains, there are strong evidences that the BCG vaccine no longer works against current TB, that is why it is discontinued in the younger generations.

They did not inject me during pri 6. They tested and i was spared the agony

 

[vamjok]

They did not inject me during pri 6. They tested and i was spared the agony

u might have natural immunity against it genetically. some are just born like that. I also immune to Hep A from a jab that was taken when I was in pri sch, it suppose to last at most 10 years but recent blood test shows that I am still immune to it.

 

[nightsafari]

u might have natural immunity against it genetically. some are just born like that. I also immune to Hep A from a jab that was taken when I was in pri sch, it suppose to last at most 10 years but recent blood test shows that I am still immune to it.

could it be continual exposure to subclinical viral loads? do you eat a lot of hum?

 

[vamjok]

could it be continual exposure to subclinical viral loads? do you eat a lot of hum?

once a while la, not daily for sure. lol

 

[Leongsam]

u might have natural immunity against it genetically. some are just born like that. I also immune to Hep A from a jab that was taken when I was in pri sch, it suppose to last at most 10 years but recent blood test shows that I am still immune to it.

My Hep B jab is still providing protection after 30 years. I wanted a booster but it turned out it wasn't necessary.

 

[vamjok]

My Hep B jab is still providing protection after 30 years. I wanted a booster but it turned out it wasn't necessary.

think you did a blood test, if the blood test shows that you have the immunity then don't waste the money.

 

[Leongsam]

think you did a blood test, if the blood test shows that you have the immunity then don't waste the money.

Yes I went to the doc and asked for a booster and he said "let's do a blood test first". He called me up the next day and said that I don't need a booster.

 

[nightsafari]

once a while la, not daily for sure. lol

that may be enough to keep your immunity up! I wish I can have a fresh plate delivered to my table now instead of stuck together after sitting in the packet...

 

[Hypocrite-The]

That just means many will go for BCG jab now. Could also b fake news to push vaccine sales

Fewer coronavirus deaths seen in countries that mandate BCG vaccine
A scientist conducts research on a vaccine for Covid-19 in California on March 17, 2020.
A scientist conducts research on a vaccine for Covid-19 in California on March 17, 2020.PHOTO: REUTERS
Published
Apr 2, 2020, 1:36 pm SGT
(BLOOMBERG) - Countries with mandatory policies to vaccinate against tuberculosis register fewer coronavirus deaths than countries that don't have those policies, a new study has found.

The preliminary study posted on medRxiv, a site for unpublished medical research, finds a correlation between countries that require citizens to get the Bacillus Calmette-Guerin (BCG) vaccine and those showing fewer confirmed cases and deaths from Covid-19.

Though only a correlation, clinicians in at least six countries are running trials that involve giving front-line health workers and elderly people the BCG vaccine to see whether it can indeed provide some level of protection against the new coronavirus.

Dr Gonzalo Otazu, assistant professor at the New York Institute of Technology and lead author of the study, started working on the analysis after noticing the low number of cases in Japan. The country had reported some of the earliest confirmed cases of coronavirus outside of China and it had not instituted lockdown measures like so many other countries have done.

Dr Otazu said he knew about studies showing the BCG vaccine provided protection against not just tuberculosis bacteria but also other types of contagions. So his team put together the data on what countries had universal BCG vaccine policies and when they were put in place. They then compared the number of confirmed cases and deaths from Covid-19 to find a strong correlation.

Among high-income countries showing large number of Covid-19 cases, the United States and Italy recommend BCG vaccines but only for people who might be at risk, whereas Germany, Spain, France, Iran and Britain used to have BCG vaccine policies but ended them years to decades ago.

China, where the pandemic began, has a BCG vaccine policy but it was not adhered to very well before 1976, Dr Otazu said. Countries including Japan and South Korea, which have managed to control the disease, have universal BCG vaccine policies. Data on confirmed cases from low-income countries was considered not reliable enough to make a strong judgment.

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With nearly 900,000 cases and 45,000 deaths, the world is struggling to control Covid-19. Any vaccine for the disease is more than a year away from being available and the effectiveness of drugs under trial will not be known for months to come. That's why it's reasonable to look at whether BCG vaccine could provide protection against Covid-19, said Dr Eleanor Fish, professor at the University of Toronto's immunology department. Dr Otazu's study is yet to undergo review by peers, a strict criteria for science studies.

"I would read the results of the study with incredible caution," Dr Fish said.

Dr Otazu, who said he's already received comments from other experts, is working on a second version of his study that will address some of their concerns. He has also submitted the study for a formal review process with the journal Frontiers in Public Health.

One of the first to conduct the trial of BCG vaccine's effectiveness against coronavirus is Dr Mihai Netea, an infectious-disease expert at Radboud Universty Medical Centre in the Netherlands.

Dr Netea's team has already enrolled 400 health workers in the trial - 200 got the BCG vaccine and 200 received a placebo. He doesn't expect to see any results for at least two months. He's also about to start a separate trial to study the effectiveness of the BCG vaccine on those older than 60. Other trials are taking place in Australia, Denmark, Germany, Britain and the US.

Scientists are still working to better understand why the BCG vaccine may be effective against not just tuberculosis but also other disease microbes.

Dr Netea's decade-long work shows that BCG vaccine sensitises the immune system in such a way that, whenever any pathogen that relies on the same attack strategy as the tuberculosis bacteria attacks, it is ready to respond in a better way than the immune system of those who haven't received the vaccine.

"It's like the BCG vaccine creates bookmarks for the immune system to use later in life," Dr Netea said.

Even if BCG vaccine is shown to be effective, that's no reason to stockpile.

"People should not hoard or try to get BCG vaccine like they did toilet paper," Dr Otazu said. There is a small chance that the BCG vaccine could increase the risk of coronavirus, but scientists won't know until after the clinical trials.

In any case, the BCG vaccine shouldn't be the only tool to fight Covid-19.

"No country in the world has managed to control the disease just because the population was protected by BCG," Dr Otazu said. Social distancing, testing and isolating cases will need to be implemented to manage the spread of the disease.

Related Stories:
A queue forms outside FairPrice Finest at Clementi Mall around 12.30pm, on April 10, 2020.

 

[Hypocrite-The]

There is no direct evidence that it works yet. It's just an observation that has been made.

Singkies kids have BCG vaccinations for free. Therefore most forumner here had the vaccine. So why worry unless a booster is needed. But I for one have never been told I need a booster shot. So is a booster shot required? Or is there such a thing as a booster shot?

 

[Leongsam]

Singkies kids have BCG vaccinations for free. Therefore most forumner here had the vaccine. So why worry unless a booster is needed. But I for one have never been told I need a booster shot. So is a booster shot required? Or is there such a thing as a booster shot?

I have never heard of anyone going for a BCG booster shot.

 

[Hypocrite-The]

I have never heard of anyone going for a BCG booster shot.

So technically those that have the BCG shot have lifetime immunity?

 

[Leongsam]

So technically those that have the BCG shot have lifetime immunity?

According to the articles I read it lasts 20 years.