Eyam's Monthly Newsletter: Scientific Updates (September 2022)

This month’s newsletter includes some commentary on the current environment that we find ourselves in, and an update on Eyam's recent scientific research.

In the first and second quarters of the year, the world turned its eyes on the war in Ukraine. Then the media cycle turned the spotlight to shortages of food and energy. We later heard that inflation was no longer “transitory.” Now after some weeks of stability, the fear gauge has been turned up again.

Some notable events that you may have missed occurred since our last newsletter:

1: COVID-19 Rebound Cases

Pfizer’s COVID-19 therapeutic, Paxlovid, was celebrated as the great tool to end severe cases of COVID, but new data shows increased rebound cases (a return of symptoms after having tested negative) and decreased effectiveness against new variants. Initially, the therapeutic was intended to treat unvaccinated patients with moderate symptoms who had underlying conditions. Over time, the therapeutic has expanded from its original intent and is being prescribed much more frequently, including to vaccinated patients over the age of 65. President Joe Biden, his wife, Dr. Jill Biden, and Dr. Anthony Fauci have all experienced COVID rebound in the last two months after taking Paxlovid. We’ve warned that leaky vaccines (vaccines that reduce symptoms but don’t prevent infection) have been shown to cause mutant viral escape leading to new variants. Now we’re seeing a decreased effectiveness of therapeutics which virologists have also warned could unleash new variants. The current dominant variant BA. 5 is the most resistant to first generation COVID-19 vaccines and has displayed a high capacity to evade natural immunity from prior infections, including prior Omicron infection.

2: Politicians Attempted to Cancel the Pandemic

This month the CDC greatly relaxed COVID-19 guidelines, backtracking on several past authoritative statements and also eliminating the need to quarantine after exposure. The government’s at-home testing supply is also nearly exhausted, which feels like a repeat of prior mistakes before the Omicron Wave in December 2021. The timing of these decisions don’t seem coincidental. Midterm elections in the US are in November and there’s a strong push to return back to normalcy, to increase feelings of stability and well-being, albeit even just for the short-term.

3: Omicron boosters available this fall, but without clinical data

In 2020, COVID-19 vaccines were brought to market in record time. Their speed to market might be remembered as something similar to breaking the 4 minute mile, a psychological barrier that once broken lead to dozens of runners also breaking the barrier over the next year. Yet, with the focus on speed, certain safety trials were compressed. Operation Warp Speed likely saved many lives, but it also caused vaccine hesitancy in millions of people. Rushing Omicron boosters to market before the fall wave and with limited data is unlikely to improve vaccine uptake and restore trust from the skeptical, or reassure the vaccine fatigued about improved vaccine protection.

4: COVID-19 Mutations Impairing Vaccine Effectiveness

Last week, quite a stir was created at Google. Many companies are in the process of transitioning their workforce back to the office and not without significant hiccups. It has been widely reported that many companies are requiring proof of vaccination status, and in some cases proof of up-to-date boosters, in order to work from the office. Yet, as reported at Google, office outbreaks and contact tracing notifications are filling anxious workers inboxes. At many companies, questions are being raised as to whether to abandon the vaccine requirement as the vaccine policy is not preventing breakthrough infections (fully vaccinated people who were infected). In fact, 40% of hospitalizations during the spring were fully vaccinated or boosted. Data is also coming out showing that the cases of reinfection have doubled over the last year and will continue to grow, likely with a decrease in the reinfection period.

5: Healthcare Staffing at Hospitals a “National Emergency”

As we move into the fall with higher rates of reinfection, therapeutics causing greater COVID-19 rebound, an ending of COVID-19 resources like at-home testing, relaxed COVID-19 restrictions, new COVID-19 boosters without data on efficacy, hospitals are also facing tremendous staffing shortages. In some parts of Canada, 79% of healthcare workers have considered resigning. Long hours, difficult conditions, and a tight labor market have created a perfect storm.

Normally the end of summer tends to be a time of vacations and getting ready for the new school year, but at Eyam we’ve been working harder than ever. With geopolitical and economic uncertainty driving the news cycle, we’ve been making great progress both on the scientific and business fronts.

An Eyam scientific update:

• Our scientific team has now completed nine animal studies in a very short time. These studies have informed our scientists on how best to optimize our vaccine platforms to improve the length of protection and strengthen vaccine efficacy. They’ve also used this data to further “train” our bioinformatics targeting platform. The studies are also providing critical safety and efficacy data that will inform the selection of our vaccine candidate for clinical trials in 2023.
• Data from seven of these nine animal studies has been analyzed and organized into a scientific paper that will summarize our findings and present our vaccine platform to the scientific and investment communities.
• To date, data shows Eyam’s vaccine platform to be safe and the self-amplifying technology to be highly effective.
• Next up for our animal work will include escalation studies which will increase dosing over time to further test for toxicity and to optimize the dosing size for clinical trials.