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One of the intriguing subplots of the COVID vaccine race has been the accidental underdosing that happened in the Oxford vaccine trial. Instead of receiving two full doses, some participants were erroneously given only half a dose in their first jab. This would be a pretty bad mistake, except that this seemed to increase the vaccine’s efficacy. There’s still no definitive answer for why this was the case.
But as Jameel Inal explains, it may be because the Oxford vaccine’s design stimulates an immune response against the vaccine itself, a response that then fights against booster doses. Reduce the first dose, the immune response against the second is lower, and efficacy rises – or so the theory goes. To test this idea, researchers are seeing what happens if they follow the first dose with a booster of Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine instead.
Our weekly vaccine roundup also looks at why the UK’s uneven rollout isn’t a problem, as well as what lower-income countries are doing to access vaccines. And if you’re keen to know whether the COVID vaccines are likely to work against the new variants of the virus, watch out for our latest webinar on the variants, taking place next Wednesday.
Meanwhile, after three and a half years of severed ties and economic embargoes, Qatar and its Gulf state neighbours have hugged and made up. And new research has found that fans of less successful Premier League football clubs are more loyal to one another.
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Rob Reddick
Commissioning Editor, COVID-19
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Jim Barber/Shutterstock
Jameel Inal, University of Hertfordshire
Vaccines that use harmless viruses as a delivery mechanism are vulnerable to being attacked by our immune system – but experimenting with how they are given could get around this.
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Empty chairs: Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and the UAE boycotted the 2017 meeting of the Gulf Cooperation council over their dispute with Qatar.
EPA-EFE/Noufal Ibrahim
Mustafa Menshawy, Lancaster University
Underlying issues which led to the three-year dispute have not been resolved.
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Fans of less successful clubs form more of a bond with each other.
Motortion Films/shutterstock.com
Martha Newson, University of Oxford
Some fans even said they would be willing to make the ultimate sacrifice, giving their own lives to save other supporters of their team.
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Environment + Energy
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Kiah Tasman, University of Bristol
Chemicals banned in the EU were recently granted an exemption for limited use in the UK.
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Andrew Frederick Johnson, Heriot-Watt University; Ingrid Kelling, Heriot-Watt University
Agreements between the EU and its partner countries for fishing rights could be a great vehicle to push sustainability but more must be done before we can say they are doing that.
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Joanna Kershaw, Plymouth University
Climate change is affecting the whole ecosystem that humpback whales depend on for food, which is making it harder for females to sustain pregnancies.
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Health + Medicine
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Rob Reddick, The Conversation
History tells us that mass vaccination campaigns are usually messy, while elsewhere, lower-income countries are turning to China, Russia and India for vaccines.
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Christian Yates, University of Bath
A virus that is 30% more transmissible is more deadly than a virus that is 30% more deadly. Counter-intuitive but true.
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Science + Technology
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Taline Kazandjian, Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine; Harry Greene, Cornell University; Nicholas Casewell, Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine; Wolfgang Wüster, Bangor University
A toxin unique to spitting cobras means their venom causes more pain than other snakes.
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Richard Faragher, University of Brighton
Anti-inflammatory drugs may be able to reverse cognitive decline in the future.
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Business + Economy
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Paul J Ennis, University College Dublin; Donncha Kavanagh, University College Dublin
While bitcoin is only a currency, the second-largest cryptocurrency is at the heart of a platform that aims to transform the internet.
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Lisa Jack, University of Portsmouth; Regina Frei, University of Southampton
The Irish retailer is one of the few high street fashion retailers without an online store.
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Politics + Society
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Barry Percy-Smith, University of Huddersfield
Some young people feel their voices and experiences during the pandemic have not been heard.
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Arts + Culture
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Adrian York, University of Westminster
People have questioned whether there’s darkness embedded in the song that many of us have missed
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Featured events
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Wivenhoe Park, Colchester, Essex, CO4 3SQ, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland — University of Essex
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Cardiff University, CUBRIC, Maindy Road, Cathays, Cardiff, CF24 4HQ, Cardiff, CF14 0UP, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland — Cardiff University
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Online Oxford Martin School Event, N/A, Oxfordshire, N/A, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland — University of Oxford
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East Road, Cambridge, Cambridgeshire, CB11PT, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland — Anglia Ruskin University
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