A Virion-Based Combination Vaccine Protects against Influenza and SARS-CoV-2 Disease in Mice
Ryan R. Chaparian, Alfred T. Harding, Cait E. Hamele, Kristina J. Riebe, Amelia Karlsson, Gregory D. Sempowski, Nicholas S. Heaton, Brook E. Heaton
Abstract
The rapid emergence of SARS-CoV-2 variants since the onset of the pandemic has highlighted the need for both periodic vaccination "boosts" and a platform that can be rapidly reformulated to manufacture new vaccines. In this work, we report an approach that can utilize current influenza vaccine manufacturing infrastructure to generate combination vaccines capable of protecting from both influenza virus- and SARS-CoV-2-induced disease. The production of a combined influenza/SARS-CoV-2 vaccine may represent a practical solution to boost immunity to these important respiratory viruses without the increased cost and administration burden of multiple independent vaccines.