“I wish all the vaccines we have were like the RNA vaccines for the coronavirus, because they have minimal side effects, in the face of the benefit against Covid19. Prophylactic vaccines for Covid19, like all prophylactic vaccines, go through 40 waves, because they are given to people who are presumed to be healthy, so we want them to be “clean”, without any side effects. Something that has largely been achieved. It’s funny to talk about side effects of vaccines when the coronavirus kills 50 people every day. The therapeutic vaccine of the same technology that is experimentally made for melanoma, has at least ten times the amount of vaccine, because we are dealing with a cancer. The cost-benefit ratio is different in cancer.”

Highlights belong to Physician – Researcher, Head of the Division of Human Retroviruses, at the US National Cancer Institute, George Pavlakis, who in an interview with the FM Agency talks in detail about the new technology of MRNA vaccines for the coronavirus. He explains why he thinks they should be done in pharmacies, while also referring to vaccination campaigns, which he says should be done all year round. The internationally renowned researcher also talks about the prospect of MRNA vaccines in cancer and other diseases, while sounding the alarm for upcoming pandemics.

Vaccination campaigns should be carried out continuously and in new ways

The coronavirus vaccines are well tested, as hundreds of millions of patients have received countless doses, and the problems they cause are minimal, if anything much less, than most vaccines we have. As time goes on, they will improve even more, says George Pavlakis and answers the question of whether we should be afraid of side effects after all. “Every time we make a vaccine, we stimulate the immune system. And when we irritate the immune system, there is a one in a million chance that problems will arise, usually transient. They are very few that need medical intervention.” For vaccination skeptics, he points out that there has been a “conspiracy of silence” in the Autumn period when people should have been told that the coronavirus is here along with the flu and RSV. “Well done to the leadership of the Greek Ministry of Health for starting a campaign even now. Better late than never. However, such campaigns should already have been done and should be done constantly in new ways, so that the citizen is not bored and fed up”. At this moment, says Mr. Pavlakis, both in America and in Greece there is the second largest peak of covid infections, since January 22, but in the context of a triple pandemic with influenza and RSV.

Why the vaccine for Covid19 should be done in pharmacies

“However, we no longer have the deaths we had at the beginning, because of the vaccines. However, it is unacceptable to have such pandemics every winter, because they create great morbidity in the population and increase premature deaths, as well as chronic diseases. We should prepare better for new pandemics that are coming, but also for the old ones, which we have not eradicated, and unfortunately we have gotten used to them, which is a mistake for all of us. We also need to improve the air we breathe.” The corona virus vaccine, he continues, should be available in pharmacies just like the flu vaccine “We have to get used to the fact that because we put another problem on our heads, we will have to deal with it in the same way that we deal with the permanent flu epidemic every winter . It also kills many, but the coronavirus kills at least ten times as many.”

The experimental melanoma vaccine is an important moment for Greece

Regarding the first experimental vaccine for melanoma that was made on Greek soil last Wednesday by the team of Dimitris Bafaloukos, in the context of a large global study, Giorgos Pavlakis comments: “It is an important moment for Greece, because a new technology enters the clinical practice, not yet as an approved drug, but as a great hope for the future.” The man who has been involved in research for more than 20 years with the technology of MRNA vaccines and knows about it as few internationally as possible, hopes that this particular vaccine will become a reality within the next one to two years, “if they really turn out as the first data show” and that it will be extended to other forms of cancer, or other diseases.

A parallel study for lung cancer was also started

“Already the same pharmaceutical companies that are funding the study on melanoma, have started another global clinical study on lung cancer.” And then what’s next? Then we’ll let our imagination run wild, he replies with his well-known biting humor: “The more money invested, the more types of cancer will be able to enter clinical studies. It’s also very important that patients participate in clinical trials, and many of them can see a huge improvement in prognosis, as they did with melanoma.” There are currently dozens, perhaps hundreds, of clinical trials for vaccines primarily against viruses and bacteria of all the organisms that cause infections and epidemics. RNA vaccines, more generally nucleic acid vaccines, have great prospects, emphasizes Mr. Pavlakis. When asked if these vaccines might replace chemotherapy, he says: “We can’t say that they will replace anything, but it will be another weapon in the arsenal that we have against diseases.”