Pfizer partner predicts pandemic ad infinitum; other experts foresee just another version of common cold

As the debate surrounding the necessity of booster shots of the COVID vaccine continues, the developer of the only vaccine to have obtained full FDA approval insists that his product will remain a vital component of every country’s healthcare strategy.Speaking to the Financial Times this week, Ugur Sahin, chief executive of BioNTech, the company that partnered with Pfizer to produce a mRNA coronavirus vaccine, expressed confidence that the existing vaccines on the market were adequate, but only for the meantime.“This year, [a different vaccine] is completely unneeded,” he said. “But by mid-next year, it could be a different situation.”Sahin said that the currently-prevalent Delta mutation was more contagious than previous variants, but that it had not mutated sufficiently in order to evade current vaccines. However, he predicted that future mutations would necessitate the development of “tailored” vaccines in order to target COVID-19 variants.“The virus will stay, and the virus will further adapt,” he said. “We have no reason to assume that the next generation virus will be easier to handle for the immune system than the existing generation. This is a continuous evolution, and that evolution has just started.”Looking ahead, Sahin described a scenario in which people who have already been vaccinated will receive booster shots, and those still vaccine-naïve will consent to vaccination.Asked to comment on suggestions made by many that vaccine availability could be enhanced (with regard to the developing world) if companies shared their patents, Sahin rejected the notion out of hand, saying that doing so would negatively impact quality control. And although he clearly foresees a future of regular booster shots in order to keep pace with a constantly evolving virus, the co-developer of the best-selling COVID vaccine would make no commitment regarding future pricing of his product.Over the ocean, the view at Moderna, Pfizer’s rival with a competing mRNA vaccine against COVID, was more optimistic. According to chief executive Stéphane Bancel, things are getting better, not worse, and by next year, coronavirus will be on a par with seasonal influenza in the way it is perceived and treated.Speaking to the Neue Zürcher Zeitung, Bancel described how “those who do not get vaccinated will immunize themselves naturally, because the Delta variant is so contagious. In this way we will end up in a situation similar to that of the flu. You can either get vaccinated and have a good winter. Or you don’t do it and risk getting sick and possibly even ending up in hospital.”Asked if that meant a return to normal life by the second half of next year, he replied, “As of today, in a year, I assume.”From epidemic, to influenza, and finally, to the common cold. According to Professor Sir John Bell, regius professor of medicine at Oxford University, COVID-19 could be relegated to the obscure fate of many other coronaviruses by as early as next spring.Bell was speaking to Times Radio and commenting on a speech made by Professor Dame Sarah Gilbert at a Royal Society of Medicine webinar two weeks ago. Gilbert, who was involved in the development of the Oxford-AstraZeneca COVID vaccine, expressed remarkable optimism regarding COVID-19’s future, explaining that “normally we see that viruses become less virulent as they circulate more easily – and there is no reason to think we will have a more virulent version of Sars-CoV-2.”She also played down the likelihood of new, vaccine-resistant variants developing, saying, “there aren’t very many places for the virus to go,” and that, “there will be gradual immunity developing in the population, as there is to all the other seasonal coronaviruses.”Bell echoed Gilbert’s view. “We’re a lot better off now than we were six months ago,” he said. “If you look at the deaths from COVID, they tend to be very elderly people, and it’s not entirely clear that it was COVID that caused all those deaths.“So I think we’re over the worst of it now,” he concluded, predicting stronger herd immunity by next spring, with people either vaccinated or immune following infection.“We have to get over the winter to get there but I think it should be fine.”